#how to start a project with cloud based

[classyrbf]

DO I LOOK LIKE HIM! — MEGUMI FUSHIGURO

SYNOPSIS...all his life it was just him and his mother, his father nowhere to be seen or found, vanished, a ghost. No one ever spoke a word of him, he didn’t even know his name. But deep down he begs for answers as his mother always said that he looked just like ‘him’

INFO...megumi fushiguro x mom!reader, toji x fem!reader, angst angst angst, megs is 17, absent father, family trauma, young love, arguing, talks of pregnancy, talks of killing/assassination, not proofread

OTHER...likes and reblogs are appreciated

based on: like him by tyler the creator

“Alright move closer into the photo—yep! Perfect!” Your mom held the camera up to her eye, slightly bending down. “Alright, three…two…one!” She snapped the photo, smiling as she looked at you and Toji.

It was Megumi’s first birthday, friends and family surrounding to celebrate. Endless gifts and food, music playing over the speakers. Small children ran around the yard, infectious laughter filling the air. The sun shined brightly, not a cloud in the sky. You were happy. Toji held Megumi tight in arm, looking down at the baby with a full head of jet black hair.

You and Toji had met in high school, falling for each other in an instant. You were captivated by his silent and mysterious presence and Toji was capture by your smile and the way your eyes shined in the light. But neither of you expected to end up with a baby boy just two years later after graduation. Not a single moment was regretted. You wouldn’t trade this for the world.

“Happy birthday, little man,” he scoffed, holding Megumi above his head. He babbled, giggling as he chewed on his chubby fingers, smiling at his father with love in his eyes.

“I can’t wait to frame this one. You guys look so cute.” Your mom pouted, walking back into the house to put the camera away.

A soft smile spread across your face, holding onto Toji’s arm. “Did you ever think you’d become a dad?” You suddenly asked, watching as your baby played with the fabric of his shirt.

Toji turned towards you, a confused look on his face. “No, but…I’m happy I did. You know I’d do anything for you two.” Toji pulled you in by your waist. “Did you ever think you’d become a mom?”

You shook your head, reaching a hand out to move hair out Megumi’s face. “It’s just weird. We were so young, you know? We still are. But, it feels right.” You rested your heard on his shoulder, letting out a small sigh. A small laugh erupted from your chest, “I carry him for nine months and he came out looking exactly like you.”

“What can I say? I got strong genes, baby.” He nudges you slightly, teasing.

“Oh, hush. I did all the work.” You roll your eyes at him.

“I’m only messing with you.” He plants a kiss on your forehead. “Go on, give mama a kiss, little man.” He holds Megumi towards you. As if on cue, he leans his head down and places his slobbery mouth on your forehead. “There you go! Good job!” He chuckles, smiling at his son. “I can’t wait until you’re older so I can teach you about all sorts of things.” Megumi grabs ahold of Toji’s finger in his small palm, squeezing it. “Gonna teach you all types of sports, how to fight so you can protect mommy. I bet you’ll be a good baseball player.” Megumi squeals at Toji. “Baseball? Yeah? Alright, baseball it is.” He kisses his cheek.

You stand there, admiring your two favorite boys. It’s like you see the future when you look at them. A happy life, a cozy home. Maybe even a sibling for Megumi. A ring on your finger, happily married. Thinking of the days when Megumi starts going to school and brings back all his little projects so you can put them in a box and keep them for the future. You already had so much planned at such a young age, but you were determined to fight for it. For him. For your son.

Megumi sits on the edge of his bed, deep in thought. The ceiling fan provides a low hum as it spins. He stares at the wilted paper in his hand, a handwritten note to him—one he’s never seen until now. His chest feels tight, tears welling in his eyes as he reads who it’s from over and over again.

—Your Dad

It feels like he can’t breathe, anger swirling through him. He thinks of all those times you dismissed his questions and conversations about his father—whoever his father was. And now, he was holding a note from him that was written fifteen years ago. A note of how sorry he is and nothing else. A man of few words. No explanation, nothing.

Growing up, Megumi learned from a young age that he looked just like ‘him’. His grandmother and grandfather always slipping up, staring at him like a ghost had just walked in the room. It only got worse as he grew older, starting growing into his features. You even began to stare at him, a look of sadness in your eyes. He never would say anything, always keeping his mouth shut like he didn’t notice. Not once, did you ever speak of his father. Hell, he didn’t even know his name or what he looked like, but from what he’s been told, he probably looks like an older version of him.

All those days, watching fathers bond with their sons, his friends dads coming to sports games, school events, he always felt like deep down something was missing. He felt different. Every Father’s Day, being tasked to make something special in school for their fathers, but how is a nine year old supposed to say he doesn’t have one? How is a thirteen year old supposed to participate in the father-son day at school when he doesn’t have one? How is a seventeen year old supposed to feel when he sees everyone posting their dads on social media, a heartfelt message written with each one, yet he doesn’t even have a photograph to remember him by?

Tears fall on the paper and the hurt that he held back is now manifesting. Why was so hard for you to say anything about him? Was he dead? Is that why it was so hard? Yet, there was no excuse. Whatever it was, he needed to know why he left. Why he was so sorry. It wasn’t until he heard the front door open, your calming voice calling out to him.

“Megs, I’m home!” You shut the door, placing your bag on the countertop.

The door to his bedroom swung open, fresh tears still on his cheeks, the wrinkled note gripped in his hand. He stomped towards you. “What is this?” His nostrils flared.

A crease between your brows formed, noticing the distressed look on his face before your eyes landed on what he was holding. You felt your heart drop, your mouth falling open to say something, anything, but nothing came out. “Meg—”

“What is this? Huh?! I found it in the back of your drawer! A note from my dad!” He slammed the paper down. “Who is he?! Why did he leave?!” He was screaming, his anger pouring out through his words. “You never talk about him! No one does!” He throws his hands up. “You kept…you fucking kept this from me! Fifteen years!” Hot tears spill from his eyes.

Your eyes widen, your lip quivering as you hold back tears. “I’m sorry.” Your voice breaks. “I’ve been wanting to tell you—”

“When? When, mom?! I don’t even know his fucking name! I don’t know what he looks like! There’s not a single picture in this house of him? Is he even alive?!” The look in his eyes makes you want to break down. You knew this day would come sooner or later, but you never expected it to turn out this way. The note. Of course it was the note. Almost like it was fate.

You inhaled deeply, licking your lips as tears fall. “I’m sorry, baby. I just…”

“Why can’t you tell me?” He speaks softly, voice wavering. “I see it in your face. Everyday when you look at me…you can see him. Who is my dad?” He clenches his jaw, letting out a shaky breath. “Why did he leave us? Why did he leave me?” He questions before fully breaking down into tears, sobbing.

“No,no,” you whisper, taking him in your arms. His tears soak through the fabric of your shirt, clinging onto you like his life depends on it. “It’s not your fault, baby? You hear me? It’s not his, not yours. It’s complicated.” As you stand there with him in your arms, flashbacks of that night Toji left flood your brain.

“Then where is he? Is he dead?” Megumi asks, raising his head to look at you. The question makes you freeze up, biting on your bottom lip so hard you’re sure to draw blood. “Is he dead, mom?” He stands up straight, wiping his tears.

“I…I don’t know,” you sniffle, shrugging your shoulders. You shake your head as you look at your son, feeling so ashamed and embarrassed. So hurt and disgusted. “He loved you so much, Megumi. I promise you.”

“What do you mean you don’t know? If he loved me, he wouldn’t have left!” He shouted in anger. “Who is he?! Just tell me!” He pleads through his cries.

“His name was Toji. Toji Fushiguro.” You stare at him. “Me and your father met young, back in high school. We had you two years after we graduated. We were so scared. Well, I was scared, but your father was ready. He was so excited,” you chuckle, remembering when you first told him you were pregnant. “He loved you, Megumi. And that’s the exact reason why he left,” you explain.

He shakes his head at you. “It doesn’t make any sense.”

“Your father did everything he could to provide for me and you. You were his everything. His little man. But, he got caught up with the wrong people trying to find ways to make quick money. He was young and desperate, we both were.” Your eyes flutter shut, letting out a sigh. “What your father did for money…you wouldn’t think he was a good man. He made enemies—”

“Mom, what are you saying?! I’m not a kid anymore! Just tell me—”

“He killed people, Megumi! Is that what you wanna hear! He fucking killed people just so he could put food on the table! Fuck!” You hurriedly stand to your feet, looking away from him.

“What…?” He nearly said in a whisper.

“I don’t want you to think he wasn’t a good man, Megs. I don’t want you think he hated you or me. He didn’t. But what he was doing put him and us in danger. He realized that and he left. He couldn’t put us in danger, especially you. That night he left he wrote you this.” You grabbed the note off the counter. “I begged him to stay, baby. I did. I tried. I tried everything.” Megumi sat on the edge of the couch, staring blankly ahead of his as he took all this information in. “He never stopped loving you, Megs. He never wanted to leave.”

He slowly turned to look at you, his chest heaving up and down. His eyes were red and glossy from crying. “Where’d he go?”

“I don’t know, baby. He never told me.” You shook your head. He sobbed softly, holding his head in his hands. You walked over, sitting beside him and pulled him into your arms. “Don’t hate him,” you whispered. “He’d be so proud of the man you became. Such a sweet, strong, and smart boy.”

“When did he leave?” Megumi asked.

“A week after your second birthday,” you spoke, biting at the skin on your lip. “He told me you were the best thing to ever happen to him.” You wipe away his tears as they continue to fall. “He’s not a bad guy, he’s just done bad things.”

Now knowing what happened to his father, Megumi felt like his whole world came crashing down. What his father did, who he was. How he came to be. And as much resentment as he holds, he can’t bring himself to hate him. In a way, he understands, but at the same time he doesn’t. He wonders how different things would be if he was here. What life would be Ike. “I’m sorry, mom,” he cried.

“Don’t be, baby. I’m sorry for keeping from you for so long. I didn’t know how to tell you. I didn’t want you to think he was a bad man. I was scared.” You continue to hold him in your arms, consoling him.

“What does he look like?” He asks.

You smile, looking down at him. “You guys are damn near twins.”

Megumi chuckles a little, “I figured.”

“Wait there a moment.” He watches as slip into your bedroom, a few second passing by before you walk out with something in your hands. “Here.”

Megumi looks down, seeing the array of photos you hold on your hands and hesitates on taking them from you. You sit beside him as he grabs them and looks at the first one. “Is that him and you?” He asks, never taking his eyes off the photo.

“Back in high school.” It was one of the first few photos you and Toji ever took together. A picture at the homecoming dance, a plain look on his face while you had a wide smile on your face. “Your father barely ever smiled. But when you came around, he couldn’t stop.”

Megumi was struck. He really did look like him. From the hair, to the eyes, to the nose. Everything. He looked at the next photo. You were pregnant, Toji holding your belly while kissing your cheek. “You guys looked really happy,” he says.

“Of course we were. Me and your dad loved each other very much. I still love him.” Megumi looks over at you as you say those last words. You still hold so much hope and love in your heart and that tells him maybe he should let this resentment for his father go. Maybe it was time to move on.

“Was this my birthday?” He questions, looking at the family photo your mother took of you three that day. He could see a faint smile on his father’s face, looking at the way Toji held him so close in his arms.

“Your very first birthday. So many good memories. Despite the fact you threw up on your dad’s shirt,” you laughed.

“Really?!” Megumi smiles. You nod, still giggling. “Yikes, he must’ve been pissed.”

“At first he was mad, but then saw you started crying after and felt horrible. I remember his exact words, ‘Stop crying, little man. You can throw up on this shirt a thousand times if you want to.’ He could never stay mad at you.” You brush his cheek, watching his smile get wider and wider.

He finally gets to the last picture. One you took of Toji asleep with Megumi on his chest. “I took that picture after it took him three hours to get you to sleep. You didn’t want to sleep in your crib, kept crying and crying and finally your father just fell asleep with you on his chest.” You watch as he runs his thumb over the picture, observing it more than he did the other ones. “You can keep it if you want.”

“Really?” He glanced at you, a desperate look in his eye.

“Of course.” You kissed his cheek. “I have more we can look at later.”

Megumi nods. There’s a moment of silence as he sits and goes through the pictures again, almost like he’s reliving memories he had no recollection of. “So, you really don’t know if he’s alive or not?”

You shake your head. “Like I said, what your father did caused him to get caught up with the wrong people, making enemies out of anyone. He was never scared of them, of course. But he knew if they ever found out about you or me, it wouldn’t end well.,” you explained. “I wish I knew.”

“Is it weird that I miss him?” He turned towards you, confused. “How can I miss someone I don’t even remember?” His eyes became teary.

“Oh, Megs.” You wiped his tears. “It’s not weird at all, sweetheart. I’m sure he misses you too. A whole lot.” You give him a sad smile.

He sniffles, looking down at the pictures. It was like he finally felt this weight had been lifted off of his shoulders. After years of this gut wrenching feeling, he finally knows the truth. His father did love you. Love him. He no longer felt casted aside. And that feeling gave him hope that maybe he’s still out there, still alive.

[treasure-mimic]

So, let me try and put everything together here, because I really do think it needs to be talked about.

Today, Unity announced that it intends to apply a fee to use its software. Then it got worse.

For those not in the know, Unity is the most popular free to use video game development tool, offering a basic version for individuals who want to learn how to create games or create independently alongside paid versions for corporations or people who want more features. It's decent enough at this job, has issues but for the price point I can't complain, and is the idea entry point into creating in this medium, it's a very important piece of software.

But speaking of tools, the CEO is a massive one. When he was the COO of EA, he advocated for using, what out and out sounds like emotional manipulation to coerce players into microtransactions.

"A consumer gets engaged in a property, they might spend 10, 20, 30, 50 hours on the game and then when they're deep into the game they're well invested in it. We're not gouging, but we're charging and at that point in time the commitment can be pretty high."

He also called game developers who don't discuss monetization early in the planning stages of development, quote, "fucking idiots".

So that sets the stage for what might be one of the most bald-faced greediest moves I've seen from a corporation in a minute. Most at least have the sense of self-preservation to hide it.

A few hours ago, Unity posted this announcement on the official blog.

Effective January 1, 2024, we will introduce a new Unity Runtime Fee that’s based on game installs. We will also add cloud-based asset storage, Unity DevOps tools, and AI at runtime at no extra cost to Unity subscription plans this November. We are introducing a Unity Runtime Fee that is based upon each time a qualifying game is downloaded by an end user. We chose this because each time a game is downloaded, the Unity Runtime is also installed. Also we believe that an initial install-based fee allows creators to keep the ongoing financial gains from player engagement, unlike a revenue share.

Now there are a few red flags to note in this pitch immediately.

Unity is planning on charging a fee on all games which use its engine.

This is a flat fee per number of installs.

They are using an always online runtime function to determine whether a game is downloaded.

There is just so many things wrong with this that it's hard to know where to start, not helped by this FAQ which doubled down on a lot of the major issues people had.

I guess let's start with what people noticed first. Because it's using a system baked into the software itself, Unity would not be differentiating between a "purchase" and a "download". If someone uninstalls and reinstalls a game, that's two downloads. If someone gets a new computer or a new console and downloads a game already purchased from their account, that's two download. If someone pirates the game, the studio will be asked to pay for that download.

Q: How are you going to collect installs? A: We leverage our own proprietary data model. We believe it gives an accurate determination of the number of times the runtime is distributed for a given project. Q: Is software made in unity going to be calling home to unity whenever it's ran, even for enterprice licenses? A: We use a composite model for counting runtime installs that collects data from numerous sources. The Unity Runtime Fee will use data in compliance with GDPR and CCPA. The data being requested is aggregated and is being used for billing purposes. Q: If a user reinstalls/redownloads a game / changes their hardware, will that count as multiple installs? A: Yes. The creator will need to pay for all future installs. The reason is that Unity doesn’t receive end-player information, just aggregate data. Q: What's going to stop us being charged for pirated copies of our games? A: We do already have fraud detection practices in our Ads technology which is solving a similar problem, so we will leverage that know-how as a starting point. We recognize that users will have concerns about this and we will make available a process for them to submit their concerns to our fraud compliance team.

This is potentially related to a new system that will require Unity Personal developers to go online at least once every three days.

Starting in November, Unity Personal users will get a new sign-in and online user experience. Users will need to be signed into the Hub with their Unity ID and connect to the internet to use Unity. If the internet connection is lost, users can continue using Unity for up to 3 days while offline. More details to come, when this change takes effect.

It's unclear whether this requirement will be attached to any and all Unity games, though it would explain how they're theoretically able to track "the number of installs", and why the methodology for tracking these installs is so shit, as we'll discuss later.

Unity claims that it will only leverage this fee to games which surpass a certain threshold of downloads and yearly revenue.

Only games that meet the following thresholds qualify for the Unity Runtime Fee: Unity Personal and Unity Plus: Those that have made $200,000 USD or more in the last 12 months AND have at least 200,000 lifetime game installs. Unity Pro and Unity Enterprise: Those that have made $1,000,000 USD or more in the last 12 months AND have at least 1,000,000 lifetime game installs.

They don't say how they're going to collect information on a game's revenue, likely this is just to say that they're only interested in squeezing larger products (games like Genshin Impact and Honkai: Star Rail, Fate Grand Order, Among Us, and Fall Guys) and not every 2 dollar puzzle platformer that drops on Steam. But also, these larger products have the easiest time porting off of Unity and the most incentives to, meaning realistically those heaviest impacted are going to be the ones who just barely meet this threshold, most of them indie developers.

Aggro Crab Games, one of the first to properly break this story, points out that systems like the Xbox Game Pass, which is already pretty predatory towards smaller developers, will quickly inflate their "lifetime game installs" meaning even skimming the threshold of that 200k revenue, will be asked to pay a fee per install, not a percentage on said revenue.

[IMAGE DESCRIPTION: Hey Gamers!

Today, Unity (the engine we use to make our games) announced that they'll soon be taking a fee from developers for every copy of the game installed over a certain threshold - regardless of how that copy was obtained.

Guess who has a somewhat highly anticipated game coming to Xbox Game Pass in 2024? That's right, it's us and a lot of other developers.

That means Another Crab's Treasure will be free to install for the 25 million Game Pass subscribers. If a fraction of those users download our game, Unity could take a fee that puts an enormous dent in our income and threatens the sustainability of our business.

And that's before we even think about sales on other platforms, or pirated installs of our game, or even multiple installs by the same user!!!

This decision puts us and countless other studios in a position where we might not be able to justify using Unity for our future titles. If these changes aren't rolled back, we'll be heavily considering abandoning our wealth of Unity expertise we've accumulated over the years and starting from scratch in a new engine. Which is really something we'd rather not do.

On behalf of the dev community, we're calling on Unity to reverse the latest in a string of shortsighted decisions that seem to prioritize shareholders over their product's actual users.

I fucking hate it here.

-Aggro Crab - END DESCRIPTION]

That fee, by the way, is a flat fee. Not a percentage, not a royalty. This means that any games made in Unity expecting any kind of success are heavily incentivized to cost as much as possible.

[IMAGE DESCRIPTION: A table listing the various fees by number of Installs over the Install Threshold vs. version of Unity used, ranging from $0.01 to $0.20 per install. END DESCRIPTION]

Basic elementary school math tells us that if a game comes out for $1.99, they will be paying, at maximum, 10% of their revenue to Unity, whereas jacking the price up to $59.99 lowers that percentage to something closer to 0.3%. Obviously any company, especially any company in financial desperation, which a sudden anchor on all your revenue is going to create, is going to choose the latter.

Furthermore, and following the trend of "fuck anyone who doesn't ask for money", Unity helpfully defines what an install is on their main site.

While I'm looking at this page as it exists now, it currently says

The installation and initialization of a game or app on an end user’s device as well as distribution via streaming is considered an “install.” Games or apps with substantially similar content may be counted as one project, with installs then aggregated to calculate the Unity Runtime Fee.

However, I saw a screenshot saying something different, and utilizing the Wayback Machine we can see that this phrasing was changed at some point in the few hours since this announcement went up. Instead, it reads:

The installation and initialization of a game or app on an end user’s device as well as distribution via streaming or web browser is considered an “install.” Games or apps with substantially similar content may be counted as one project, with installs then aggregated to calculate the Unity Runtime Fee.

Screenshot for posterity:

That would mean web browser games made in Unity would count towards this install threshold. You could legitimately drive the count up simply by continuously refreshing the page. The FAQ, again, doubles down.

Q: Does this affect WebGL and streamed games? A: Games on all platforms are eligible for the fee but will only incur costs if both the install and revenue thresholds are crossed. Installs - which involves initialization of the runtime on a client device - are counted on all platforms the same way (WebGL and streaming included).

And, what I personally consider to be the most suspect claim in this entire debacle, they claim that "lifetime installs" includes installs prior to this change going into effect.

Will this fee apply to games using Unity Runtime that are already on the market on January 1, 2024? Yes, the fee applies to eligible games currently in market that continue to distribute the runtime. We look at a game's lifetime installs to determine eligibility for the runtime fee. Then we bill the runtime fee based on all new installs that occur after January 1, 2024.

Again, again, doubled down in the FAQ.

Q: Are these fees going to apply to games which have been out for years already? If you met the threshold 2 years ago, you'll start owing for any installs monthly from January, no? (in theory). It says they'll use previous installs to determine threshold eligibility & then you'll start owing them for the new ones. A: Yes, assuming the game is eligible and distributing the Unity Runtime then runtime fees will apply. We look at a game's lifetime installs to determine eligibility for the runtime fee. Then we bill the runtime fee based on all new installs that occur after January 1, 2024.

That would involve billing companies for using their software before telling them of the existence of a bill. Holding their actions to a contract that they performed before the contract existed!

Okay. I think that's everything. So far.

There is one thing that I want to mention before ending this post, unfortunately it's a little conspiratorial, but it's so hard to believe that anyone genuinely thought this was a good idea that it's stuck in my brain as a significant possibility.

A few days ago it was reported that Unity's CEO sold 2,000 shares of his own company.

On September 6, 2023, John Riccitiello, President and CEO of Unity Software Inc (NYSE:U), sold 2,000 shares of the company. This move is part of a larger trend for the insider, who over the past year has sold a total of 50,610 shares and purchased none.

I would not be surprised if this decision gets reversed tomorrow, that it was literally only made for the CEO to short his own goddamn company, because I would sooner believe that this whole thing is some idiotic attempt at committing fraud than a real monetization strategy, even knowing how unfathomably greedy these people can be.

So, with all that said, what do we do now?

Well, in all likelihood you won't need to do anything. As I said, some of the biggest names in the industry would be directly affected by this change, and you can bet your bottom dollar that they're not just going to take it lying down. After all, the only way to stop a greedy CEO is with a greedier CEO, right?

(I fucking hate it here.)

And that's not mentioning the indie devs who are already talking about abandoning the engine.

[Links display tweets from the lead developer of Among Us saying it'd be less costly to hire people to move the game off of Unity and Cult of the Lamb's official twitter saying the game won't be available after January 1st in response to the news.]

That being said, I'm still shaken by all this. The fact that Unity is openly willing to go back and punish its developers for ever having used the engine in the past makes me question my relationship to it.

The news has given rise to the visibility of free, open source alternative Godot, which, if you're interested, is likely a better option than Unity at this point. Mostly, though, I just hope we can get out of this whole, fucking, environment where creatives are treated as an endless mill of free profits that's going to be continuously ratcheted up and up to drive unsustainable infinite corporate growth that our entire economy is based on for some fuckin reason.

Anyways, that's that, I find having these big posts that break everything down to be helpful.

[shellshocklove]

hot 'n' heavy | joel miller

pairing/AU: mom's friend from work!joel miller x female!reader

summary: hiding away in your room during your mother's annual work party, your mom's friend from work, the handsome joel miller, finds you in a compromising position.

warnings: this is an 18+ fic so mdni! swearing, age gap (reader is college age), use of pet names, pwp, smut, f!masturbation, dom!joel, daddy!joel, manhandling, oral (m receiving), degradation (slut), pussy spanking, unprotected sex (don't do it!), creampie, no use of y/n

a/n: this is just something short and smutty. i debated not posting this tbh since it felt a little simple and not as detailed + with no plot, but it's been so long since i've written anything at all so i'm gonna look at it as a win that it's something lol

main masterlist / ao3 / fic updates

from the river to the sea, palestine will be free 🇵🇸 this account stands with palestine. the creator of tlou is a zionist, and the second game is largly based on israel/palestine. please, everyone who interacts, educate yourself about the genocide happening right now, and support/donate.

"Fuck… Is this really what ya want, sweetheart?"

Joel's voice was barely a whisper, something deep and gravely as he let his thumb skate over your cheek. It was depraved how gone you were already: half-naked on your knees before a man you barely knew, your eyes half-lidded from his touch, and your panties soaked through with your arousal.

You shouldn't be doing this.

Joel worked with your mother. He wasn't technically her coworker – a fact you'd cling to tomorrow when the reality of your actions would settle in – he was a contractor the company she worked for used for most of their projects. That's why he was here tonight, in your childhood home, attending your mother's work party.

You hadn't planned on visiting this weekend, didn't really plan on it for the foreseeable future either, but the devil herself (your roommate) had basically kicked you out because her army boyfriend (ugh) was visiting. With no place to go, if you didn't want to spend this month's paycheck on a last minute hotel room for two nights, you'd ended up going home.

Technically, and you'll forever be hung up on the technicalities of this situation, you were supposed to be studying at your desk in your childhood bedroom… not getting caught in bed masturbating by your mother's coworker.

To say getting caught had been embarrassing was an understatement. That he'd seen the glistening of your arousal on your fingers when you'd quickly retracted your hand from your panties and seen the porn video flicker over your phone screen… was even worse. But the fact that he was the most gorgeous man you'd ever seen, was definitely the worst part of this situation.

"'m sorry, sweetheart," he let out an embarrassed chuckle, like he couldn't believe what he'd walked in on, "I was just lookin' for the bathroom."

"It's at the end of the hall," you peeped out.

"Right… thanks," he said, his hand still lingering on your door handle.

A beat passed, and your eyes locked with his where you could glimpse something darker clouding them. It ignited something inside you, played the strings of the arousal still settling inside you, and sparked a hint of bravery in the pit of your stomach.

"You can use my bathroom if you like?" Biting down on your bottom lip, a lilt of innocence coated your words.

Something like a smile twitched over his face, and his grip on the door handle tightened slightly as he seemed to weigh his options. A loud choir of laughs could be heard coming from the back yard, and like the sound had made the decision for him, he stepped inside your bedroom.

"Through here?" he asked, pointing to your open bathroom door.

"Yes," you nodded, putting on a sugar coated smile across your face. When he'd closed the door after him, you weren't thinking straight; the lingering arousal from earlier drove your actions.

What was his name again? Something starting with J… John? James? No. Joel– Joel Miller.

Removing your hoodie and exposing the ribbed tank top underneath you remembered how he'd introduced himself to you at the start of the night. He'd been early, and your mother had forced you to say hello right before you'd sought refuge in your room for the rest of the night. His hand had engulfed your own as he'd shook it, calloused hands rough against your skin, and the friendly wink he'd given you as he'd introduced himself had had a swarm of wings fluttering in your tummy.

Pushing the covers away your heart was beating out of your chest as you heard the toilet getting flushed and your sink turn on. This would either be the worst or the best decision you'd ever made.

When he stepped out of your bathroom you sat up a little straighter and pulled your knees coquettishly to your chest – innocently, but with intent. Joel's eyes followed the movement and you knew he could see the wet spot where you'd soaked through your panties.

He didn't say anything for what felt like an eternity– he only watched you, his jaw tightening before the deep bass of his voice broke across the silence, "Y'know I work with your mother–"

"Technically you don't," you cut him off, a teasing smirk coating your lips.

Joel huffed out a short laugh. "I don't?" he challenged with a raise of an eyebrow.

"No," you shook your head slowly and spread your legs apart.

Joel's eyes were nothing close to subtle as you exposed yourself to him. "You shouldn't be doin' this, sweetheart– d'you know how old I am?"

"I don't care," you sighed, and let a hand glide down your body, your fingers toying with the elastic band of your panties.

"Clearly," he remarked, his voice strained.

Slipping your hand into your panties, your fingers found your clit where you started to press down in tight circles. Hitching out a small breath your eyes never left Joel's, and you watched as his whole body stiffened.

"Sweetheart," he warned, his voice stern as he stepped closer.

"Please," you breathed out, fingers still working your clit.

"Please, what?" he pressed, stepping so close to your bed now he could reach out to touch you.

"Please…" you pouted, making Joel let out a deep groan, "Want you to fuck me."

"Fuck– you're dirty baby," he whispered, and the way his voice seemed to get deeper and deeper made you rub your clit even faster.

"You have no idea," you whimpered as you looked up at him as innocently as you possibly could through your lashes, but you knew he saw right through your little ruse when his hand locked around your bare knee.

One sweet little plea was all it took for him to snap, and in one quick sweep Joel had you on your knees in front of him. The straps of your tank top had fallen off your shoulders from his manhandling, exposing the top of your chest. Your hands moved with haste then, fingering the buckle of his belt and pushing it through the loop.

"Fuck… Is this really what ya want, sweetheart?" Joel asked, his hand finding your cheek and letting his thumb skate over your skin.

Looking up at him through your lashes you nodded into his hand. It felt insane to admit it, but there was nothing you wanted more in this moment than him; a man you barely knew, a man too old to be even close to appropriate, but it only turned you on even more.

Over you, Joel's eyes had darkened into a stormy sea where rough waves of arousal crashed against his irises. Staring into your own eyes, Joel's jaw tightened and then popped. "Fuck… undo my belt, sweetheart," he ordered and let go of your cheek.

Wasting no time your fingers pulled his belt from the loops and popped the button of his pants. Through the fabric you could feel the way his cock had hardened, and you couldn't help but lean in closer to press open mouthed kisses along his clothed length.

"That's a good girl," Joel sighed, as the comforting weight of his hand found the back of your head. You couldn't help but sigh at the praise and a rumbling laugh tore through his chest at your reaction.

"You liked that didn't you?" he coaxed.

Turning your face to the side, you pressed your cheek against his clothed cock while you looked up to find his eyes. If your panties weren't soaked through with your arousal and your whole body tingling with excitement, you'd be embarrassed. But in this moment, Joel's teasing only made you wetter.

"Please," you begged, wide-eyed and pathetic with arousal, "please, I need your cock."

Joel's hand found the back of your neck where he gripped it, not hard enough to hurt, but hard enough to make a point.

"Yeah, sweetheart? Need to be fucked nice and hard by a real man, huh?" he mocked, his voice laced with fake pity. Before you could whine out an answer he let go of your neck with a small push. "But first…" he grinned and leaned back, fishing out your phone from your sheets, "let's see what's made you this fuckin' needy for m'cock."

The video you'd watched, before he'd walked in on you with your fingers down your panties, were still playing silently on your phone. Still on your knees for him, you felt your cheeks burn with embarrassment when his eyes widened and a small chuckle left his lips.

Holding your phone an arms length away from his face, he read out loud, "'Big Dicked Daddy Creampies Needy girl'– that's what you want sweetheart, need to get fucked raw and filled up with cum?"

"Yes," you nodded, eagerly and desperate, your cunt so wet it was starting to hurt.

"Yes, what, sweetheart?" he asked with a raise of his eyebrow, "let me hear ya say it f'me."

"Yes… Daddy?" you tried, and a satisfied smile spread across Joel's face. Throwing your phone back on your bed, Joel's fingers undid his zipper.

"Now take my cock out– c'mon," he ordered, almost impatiently.

With fingers shaking from excitement, you looped them through the elastic band of his underwear and pulled it down along with his pants, revealing inch by inch of his thick hard cock. Leaning back on your haunches you tipped your head back slightly to avoid his cock hitting you in the face.

Freed from its confinements, you wasted no time wrapping your hands around him.

His cock was thick with a throbbing vein running down to the base where a patch of dark and silver wiry hair met his happy trail. At the tip of him a pearl of precum had started to bead, and mesmerized you leaned forward to place a soft kiss to the thick head.

A deep noise rumbled in Joel's chest at your action, and his hand fell back to rest on the back of your head again. "Spit on it, baby–" he sighed and pushed your head a little closer, "C'mon, stroke that spit in."

Tipping your head back slightly, you met his eyes while you gathered a blob of spit in your mouth and spat! Your spit dribbled over the shaft and over where your fist struggled to meet around him, and with slick slow movements, you started to stroke his cock.

"Thaaaat's it," Joel groaned, "just like that."

Shifting your weight on your knees you sat up a little straighter as you jerked his cock in a slow steady rhythm. Your spit made the glide go easy, and above you Joel let out short deep groans with every tug on his cock. Leaning in a little closer, you lined the tip up with your mouth, but before you wrapped your lips around him, you hesitated.

"C’mon, sweetheart, nothin’ to be afraid of,” he soothed, the hand at the back of your head pushing you forward towards his cock, “I know you wanna taste.”

With his encouragement, you closed your lips around the tip of his hard cock – tasting him, finally, for the first time. Running your tongue around the sensitive head in slow circles, you teased the underside of him as you hummed, closing your eyes with contentment.

"There you go," he whispered, "S'good, baby."

Encouraged, you took him deeper into your mouth, testing your limits as the hefty length of him made room for himself inside your mouth. You couldn’t fit him all inside, gagging as the head of him hit the back of your throat, and forcing you to pull back with a cough.

"You're alright, baby," he cooed, stroking the back of your head as you recovered through gasps of air.

Never known to be a quitter, you pushed him back down your throat again a second time. Dropping your jaw and relaxing your throat, it was easier this time, and soon you were bopping your head on his cock. In your mouth you felt his cock grow even harder, and soon enough Joel met your mouth with small thrusts of his own.

Hushed rambles of praise fell from his lips. A sweet symphony through the wet sound of his cock hitting the back of your throat. Snot ran from your nose and mixed with the spit dripping down your chin while tears started to travel down your cheeks in salty rivers. It was dirty, and wet, and so so hot. Pulling off every once in a while when you needed air, you flashed him a wet smile before he was back in your throat again.

Through your open window, a sudden loud cheer came from the garden and startled you. Accidentally you pushed him down too deep, gagging yourself on his cock. Gasping for air you quickly pulled off his cock.

"I know," he cooed, two large palms wiping at the spit around your jaw, "You did so well, baby."

"N-need you to touch me, Daddy," you told him with pleading eyes, your voice raw and used.

"Yeah?" he coaxed, "Bend over then, sweetheart, let Daddy see you pussy."

With a strong hand wrapped around your bicep, Joel helped you on your feet. Unsteady like a newborn foal, he pushed you down on your stomach against the edge of your twin bed. His hands found your ass where they rubbed soothing circles over the muscle, before you felt him split your ass cheeks apart to put your clothed cunt on display.

"You're a little slut aren't you, sweetheart?" he asked, and you could hear the smirk in his voice, "You're so fuckin' wet f'me and I ain't even touched you yet," he laughed.

But there was nothing to laugh about in this situation.

A second later Joel pulled your panties to the side, exposing your wet cunt to him and let a harsh spank come down on your folds.

With a whiny cry, your whole body jerked at the impact. A prickling pain mixed with your burning arousal, and even with practically no stimulation, you felt right on the edge already.

One strong hand gathered your wrists behind your back as you felt the weight of him over your back. "Shhh," he hushed into your ear. With his other hand he guided the wide head of his cock through your soaked folds, slicking himself in your arousal. "Listen," he commanded, "y'hear how fuckin' wet you are?"

He gave you no room to answer him as he pushed the head past your entrance, and filled you up with his cock in one rough jerk of his hips. Instead, what came out of your mouth was a surprised moan.

"Bet that felt good, huh? That pussy's finally filled up like she needed?" Joel cooed into your ear.

Nodding your head, your cheek pressed tightly to your mattress, you managed to croak out a satisfied, "Yes, Daddy."

Pleased, Joel pulled out slowly before he slammed back inside you again, splitting you open on his cock as he made you take it. He felt so big inside you, that heavy pressure of him hitting the deepest parts of you just right with every kant of his hips. Moaning unabashedly, you let him fuck you hard and fast, guiding your body back against his cock with the grip of his hand around your wrist.

"'f your mother only knew what a fuckin' slut you are, baby," he hushed out under his breath between jerks of his hips. "The door's not even locked– anyone could walk in on you gettin' fucked."

Lost on the feeling of his cock inside you, a fire ignited in your belly at his words. You felt yourself get even more turned on at the thought of getting caught, of exactly how exposed you'd be if someone were to open your bedroom door at exactly this moment.

"Don't worry your pretty little head 'bout it– I won't tell," Joel told you, emphasizing every word with a harsh thrust.

Pushing himself as deep as he could, his balls slapping against your clit, a deep moan rumbled from deep in his chest. Your own moan got stuck in your chest as he grinded his hips against your ass – making sure the tip of his cock rubbed against your g-spot – before he resumed his rhythm.

"You're makin' such a big mess on my cock, sweetheart… it's drippin' down my balls," he grunted, "That turn you on? Getting caught gettin' fucked by an old man?" he chuckled.

"P-please," was the only thing you could manage between your breathy mewls, "I-I'm c-close."

"Yeah, I know, baby, I know. Can feel you squeezin' me so fuckin' tight– so perfect for this big cock," he praised.

Shifting his grip around your wrist, he snuck his other hand between your legs where his calloused fingers found your neglected clit. Pushing down on it in rough circles, you let out a squeal at the new stimulation.

"I know, I know, sweetheart, " he cooed, "I know you want to come all over Daddy's big cock– come while I rub this little clit."

"Y-yes," you moaned, his hips slapping harshly against your ass as Joel brought you closer and closer to the edge of ecstasy. Tears had started to darken your sheets with a wet patch as you heaved for breath. You were right there, right on the edge now.

"You want my cum don't you? Want it inside?" he grunted the question in your ear.

"Please," you hiccuped.

Above you Joel’s groans and moans got louder, as he sped up his rhythm.

"Fuck, baby, 'm close– come f'me now, come for Daddy," he commanded, and with the kant of his hips and a flick of your clit, you came around Joel's thick cock.

Arching your back off the mattress and kanting your hips, your body shook as you rode through your high. Above you, Joel’s movement had become even more erratic, thrusting himself deeper and deeper before a loud groan vibrated through his chest.

Pushing himself deep inside you, Joel came inside you. A warmth filled you as he emptied himself, filling you and coating your walls with his spend.

"That's it– take that fuckin' cum," he rambled, forcing your hips to stay flush against his thighs.

As both your highs started to slowly fizzle out, Joel slowly pulled back and pushed his hips back in shallow thrusts, making sure to give you every single drop of his cum. Sensitive from your orgasm, the pressure of his thick cock inside you was almost too much, and with a small whine you pulled away.

"No-no-no," he said, his hands tightening around your hips, "Stay right there just a little longer f'me baby– good girl."

Satiated, you released a breathy sigh into the mattress as you felt a tiredness wrap itself around you. Joel's hands loosened around your hips, instead he rubbed soft circles over your skin, before he slowly pulled out and snapped your panties back in place.

For a beat you didn't move, but the metal sound of Joel's belt buckling had you turning over on your back. The lamp on your bed side table casted soft warm shadows over his face as you watched him put himself back together again.

"You okay?" he asked you, his voice low but warm – all his rough teasing gone now and replaced by the friendly man you'd shaken hands with for the first time only a few hours ago.

"More than okay," you smiled, "I can't believe that actually happened."

Your words pulled a chuckle from his chest. "Wouldn't mind if it happened again," he smiled.

"Me neither."

........................................................................................................................

i hope someone out there liked this little fic. i'd love to hear your thoughts either in a comment or as an ask! <3

© shellshocklove, 2024 i do not give any permission to repost, translate, feed to AI or redistribute any of my writing, with or without credit!

[strawberryfloofs]

i wanna be treated like the age i regress to!!! (toddler based) if you have something to do, set up an activity for me to keep me occupied while youre doing grown up stuff! help me get dressed, even if i argue im a big girl and i can do it! (i cant and if you believed me, id whine and make grabby hands for my mama to help) im fussy about bedtime? "oh i know doll, but lets get those teethies brushed and mama can read you a story, hm? how about a warm baba too?" instant distraction = no fussiness

give me snacks and cut up my fruit for me! bonus points if its cute shapes :D if im being left alone, check on me time to time and feel the dread if you hear no more giggles and playing (better hope im feeling sleepy or watching a show and not getting into trouble...) try to answer my random questions about everything like "wy mama has big gir cup an no floofy?" "Because mama is a grown up that doesn't spill drinks, and you're her little baby thats a little clumsy n she loves you just the way you are!" - "doeses dinosaurz hab woving mommies and daddies toos?" "Hm, I think so- how else would they have gotten so big and strong back then?" you wanna watch a grown up show on the tv? get me some toys ands set up a little area in the living room for me, or even give me a device temporarily understand my big emotions over seemingly small things and comfort me! (totally not projecting because i also didnt totally call Clovey the lion a big meanie poo head [she is not one] bc I wanted Bingo as a nini stuffie instead of her [Bingo was across the room] and started whining and getting upsetti spaghetti) make me hold your hand or something else (like a grocery cart buggy) in public because if not, I might get distracted and wonder off. understand it might take a while to get my attention and be hard to sustain it/get me to listen because im really tiny! "bubs, can you look at mommy? you can play after this, i promise, but its reallly super duper important!" (i cant be the only one whos brain is totally clouded with tiny thoughts and urges right? who wants to listen to a grownup when you can stack blocks instead-) just writing this makes me feel sorta tiny eee

[astra-ravana]

How To Amplify Your Magick

✵Accept That You Do Not Know: It's okay to not have all the answers. You don't have to be certain all of the time. Magick is the realm of the unknown. If it was ultimately knowable, then science would have already measured and verified it. On the other hand, things that would have once been considered magick are now common technology. So, there is a spectrum from useless knowledge to solid fact. It's up to you to decide which is which and keep a sharp, critical mind.

✵Think For Yourself: Anything that someone else has figured out , you can figure out too. The human mind's potential is illimitable. But we are continually duped into believing that we can't do it, that someone else should do it for us. Unless you're ready to think for yourself, you'll end up as a fake, or worse, someone else's pawn.

✵Keep An Open Mind: You have to be open to new ideas. An open mind is half closed, so they say. A door that is half closed is still open, and it's much the same with the mind. Don't accept as truth anything you hear, only accept the possibility that it may be. You'll have to rigorously seek out truth for yourself with a critical mind. The emphasis on truth is essential. Illusion is based on deceit, real magick on truth.

✵Reduce Your Assumptions: An assumption is basically just a guess. We make a lot of guesses in life from if gods exist to whether the floor will be there when we get out of bed in the morning. Guessing is a psychological reflex and its unlikely that we can ever fullybe free from it. The more you can manke conscious your unconscious assumptions, the more you will notice strange and magickal things about yourself, others, and the Universe.

✵Judge Not: Judgment of others clouds your awareness. Like assumption, it's a reflex. Try reserving judgment when you can. Allow yourself the patience the gather more knowledge and insight into matters. If someone seems like an idiot, ask them genuine questions. Get experience with why others think and act the way they do. Whenever you avoid judging others, you can gain wisdom.

✵Shed Expectations: Another habitual block to your magickal potential is your expectations. Our imagination is always in use, whether consciously or unconsciously. Things are going to be as they are, whether you like it or not. The thing about expectation is that people see not what they want to see, but instead what they expect to see. Projecting our image of things on the present moment or into the future is an unnecessary expenditure of energy that can be freed for authentic magickal experience.

✵Stop Labeling Everything: What is our obsession with classifying things? As soon as we have a word or a name for something, we believe that we understand what that thing is. We can't help this, it's just how our minds work. Try to notice when you are doing this. Naming can be a very powerful magickal act, but only if it's conscious. Habitual labeling will actually end up as an obstacle to true understanding.

✵Surrender To What Is: This is about allowing the present moment to just be. We tend to believe that the present is similar to the future, in that we can change it. But the present is more like the past, in that once it's here, it's here, real and unalterable. If you don't accept that, accept that you can't accept it. Look at what is around you and see that is is how it is.

✵Cultivate Courage: Courage is essential in many traditions, and the Universe rewards courage with 'Hamingja', a form of luck or charisma. It goes by many names in many traditions, but the basis is simply that courageous acts are rewarded by the Universe. Start small and work your way up. You may not br able to start with your ultimate fears, but tackle what you can and you will get there in time. The more courage you possess, the greater your magickal ability.

✵Trust The Universe: If you only have faith in one thing, have faith in this... Ultimately this Universe is here for you to learn what you must learn, to face what you must face, and to allow you to find enlightenment. It's not out to get you, quite the opposite. Enthusiasm and playfulness are two of the strongest mindsets with which we can engage in our exploration of magick. Go with thr flow!

✵Meditate: Meditation can be very simple. Sit up straight, focus on your breathing, and the feeling of your life force. Connect with yourself. It will help you master your mind and achieve grounded clarity.

✵Put It Into Action: You can read all the books, attand all the lectures, join all the groups, and talk on and on about magick, but in the end, nothing will happen unless you find some practical means to put it into action. Don't just think, do. Manifest your desires by practicing and experimenting. Learn through trial and error and it will be more valuable and powerful than anything anyone can tell you.

[cowboyod]

Another Man's Jeans

summary - You run into Spencer at Angela's birthday party for the first time since the breakup.

warnings - a little angsty

pairing - Spencer Agnew x reader

word count - 2665

note - Based loosely on Another Man's Jeans by Ashe. Let me know if you like it! I have a little more written so let me know if you want more!

“Listen, I know you really, really don’t want to see Spencer right now but it would mean a lot to me if you could come.” Angela pleads to you. Her birthday is coming up and Chanse and her have planned a party to celebrate. You know it’ll be a ton of fun and Angela has been talking about it for ages. The performances and the karaoke and all the details planned out sound incredible but the fact that Spencer is going is a huge deterrent. 

“I love you, I’ll think about it, okay? If I don’t show up I’ll make sure we do something special together, how does that sound?” You bargain with the birthday girl and she seems unsatisfied. 

“Pretty, pretty please. Think about it really, really hard.”

You met Spencer on the Smosh Pit set. You were just a one off guest, invited to be a part of an episode of Try Not To Laugh by one of the producers after they saw some of your own youtube videos. You were thrilled to be invited and meet some of the cast and crew. Spencer was in the crowd that day and every time you were doing your bits on the stage, he would catch your eye. You did your best to avoid eye contact while in the hot seat and failed miserably. Little did you know that this opportunity would turn into so much more than just one fun day.

After being invited to a couple Smosh shoots, you hit it off with a few of the cast members. You and Angela became close friends and invited you out with her, Chanse, and some of her other friends often. Angela had noticed Spencer and you giving each other eyes every time you were invited for videos and he  made sure he was either in the room watching the recording, or in the video when you were there. Eventually, Angela began to invite Spencer when you would agree to plans and vice versa. Then began what is arguably the best year of your life. 

After about a year of dating, Spencer and you began to hit a rough patch, both becoming incredibly busy and not being able to make time for each other. 

You are sitting at your desk deep in thought and frustration, looking at the near blank page in front of you. ‘Why are scripts so hard to start’ you think to yourself. You have about a thousand projects to finish and have started another one that was assigned to you by your script writing professor. You can never seem to get past that blank page without hours of frustration. The lingering editing projects and essays you also have unfinished cloud your mind and you are so visibly overwhelmed.

You feel arms wrap around you from behind your desk chair and you startle a tad. “Oh. Hey Spence, you scared me. Now's not a good time.” You say shortly, bringing him into your frustrated mind. “Why don’t you take a break? We could throw on a movie or something?” Spencer offers. “I really need to finish this, or start it I guess. I have a ton to do. I don't know if I have the time right now.” Tension grows in your voice and he squeezes your shoulder before leaving you alone.

Between school and passion projects, you never had time to do much anymore. And Spencer was drowning in his work schedule, trying to plan shoot weeks and games content and livestreams became taxing on him. The energy between the two of you began to dwindle and you would often break into exhaustion bridled arguments that always ended in one of you going back to your own apartment. The breakup made no sense to any of your friends, the two of you seemed perfect together. You were both always so supportive of each other and participated in each other’s hobbies and interests, you two were inseparable at one point. But the breakup made sense to you. You were sick of the fighting and so, so tired. It didn’t feel worth the fight anymore despite how much it hurt. Spencer hated the conversation. He loathed the fact that you gave up on fighting for him but he also felt the exhaustion of it all. 

Your finger lingers on his contact name. You fight your instincts and decide to call Angela instead. “Hey, honey! Happy Birthday! I love you!” You greet after she picks up. You both talk about the day ahead of her and her party later that night that Chanse and a few others are beginning to set up soon. “Yeah, hey! I think I’m gonna come out tonight. I want to celebrate with you and I have such a great gift.”

“Awwwe babe you don’t have to!” You can hear her smiling through the phone. “I’m so excited for you to come. It’s gonna be a relatively big party so hopefully you’ll barely even see Spencer.”

“It’s not even fair for me to be upset about seeing him. Like I’m the one who broke up with him. I feel like I don’t even have a right to be upset about it.”

“Your feelings are valid. Even if you’re the one who ended it, it’s still a tough thing to get through. You’re allowed to feel whatever you’re feeling.”

“I guess you’re right. I just don’t want him to hate me. I miss being around him. It's been months and It still hurts.”

While on the phone with Angela, she helps you pick out an outfit, landing on a casual green dress paired with your favorite doc martens. You felt pretty for the first time in months and you were excited to leave the house for once. You took your time getting ready, treating this like the event of the year. You weren’t going all out by any means but you felt good taking the time to get ready and feel good about yourself.

You take an uber to the venue just in case you have one too many drinks tonight. You’re early enough that you can help setting up the final bits of the party and Chanse puts you to work. You help set up tables and put out flowers and other finishing details and he runs off and makes sure everything else is going according to plan. People begin flooding in about half an hour later and Angela shows up not too long before the crowd.

“You look good, babe! Happy Birthday! Here’s your little gift, you can open it later if you want.” You smile at the birthday girl widely and give her hugs. 

“Oh my god! Stop! This is so cute!” Angela opens the bag to find a glass olive oil container with a pretty glass floral design. You remembered her talking about wanting some cuter kitchen stuff and you found the drizzle bottle at a local craft store and thought she’d love it. Angela put it away and after talking for a little bit, she excused herself to talk to some of her friends from Starkid. You wander to the snack table to see what kind of things they have and hopefully run into someone you know so you don’t look so alone. You grab yourself a little drink to keep your hands busy and scan the room for people to talk to. Unfortunately, you lock eyes with a particular curly haired boy. Of course you find him in a crowded room, you’ve always had a knack for finding him in crowds. I mean, who else would you possibly want to look at in a room full of people? You give him a tight smile, take a sip of your drink and try to look elsewhere. No matter where you looked, your mind kept wandering back to him. You wondered if he was still looking at you, if the eyes you felt burning into your skull were his, the eyes you had grown so used to. His eyes felt so familiar but so distant. You knew coming here was a bad idea, he corroded your thoughts without being anywhere near you, of course you were going to go crazy with him only some feet in front of you. You looked around again and found out that the eyes burning into your head were not his but a mere stranger’s. You couldn’t help but feel a little disappointed.

The eyes boring into your skull draw closer to you. The man introduces himself and you can’t seem to get his name to stick. You let him stick by your side because why not have a little fun? A distraction with a name you don’t remember might be what you need. He offers you another drink and you sit around with him and talk for a long while about nothing in particular. You think he’s talking about cars, his mustang, maybe? Who cares? All you can think about is Spencer. How he’s here somewhere, maybe flirting with some other girl or maybe, hopefully, he’s thinking about you. The man snags a flower from one of the nearby decorations and offers it to you, charmingly. “For you.” 

“Keep your flowers, let’s go dancing!” You offer with a spark in your eyes. He follows you to the floor as music blares through the speakers. You dance with the stranger while thinking of another. After a couple songs, the music cuts and Chanse is on stage beginning a little speech about our special, little Angela. Chanse planned out a couple show bits and after the speech, a musical number begins and the crowd is thrilled. You lean against the man you were dancing with and smile at how fun this whole thing is and how wonderful Chanse is at this whole party planning thing. 

You look around and once again make eye contact with Spencer. You feel a little loopy and you can’t tell if it's the alcohol, the lights, the music, or Spencer. You give him a little head tilt and brow scrunch, confused by his almost blank expression. He looked bored almost? Maybe annoyed? He is so hard to read nowadays. Not like you see him often anymore. He looks at the guy beside you and then back at you, jaw clenched. 

You look at the guy you’ve stuck around so far and decide you’ve had enough of him for now. “Hey, would you grab me a water?” He nods and walks off and you make eye contact with Spencer again. You think about going over there and talking to him but he wanders off before you get the chance. Luckily, you see Amanda across the room talking to a couple other Smosh members and decide to join them. “Hi, guys! Great party Chanse has done an amazing job!” You enter the group.

“Hey! Yeah, he’s great isn’t he? Angela seems to be having the time of her life! I’m glad you came!” Amanda greets. Shayne and Tommy speak about the party and the show before falling back into conversation about recent movies that have come out. 

Time passes and karaoke is a show stopper. Everyone is adoring the silly performances their friends are putting on. Chanse and Angela do a duet and people jokingly throw things on stage. The party is lively as ever and you cheer on all your friends as they go on stage. You and Shayne stick together, avoiding actually participating at all costs but continue to clap and cheer in support. The song is about to end and you look around to see who is going on next. Spencer looks at you and nods his head towards the stage, asking if you were gonna go up. You eyes go wide and you shake your head violently, he knows you would never. He laughs at your dramatics. 

Shayne sees this interaction and just nods and gives Spencer a look without you noticing. Spencer bites the corner of his lip and makes his way over to the two of you. “You guys should go up and do a duet” He laughs and you two look horrified at the idea. His laugh rings through your head. The absence of his laugh for the past few months has stung. 

“Yeah not happening tonight!” Shayne responds.

“You know I’d have to be like, totally out of my mind to even consider it, Spence.” The nickname rolls off your tongue so easily it almost startles you. It’s like you’ve fallen right back into place with him in front of you. But it’s never that easy. You and Spencer stay quiet for a moment and Shayne leaves quietly to find Courtney. 

“Hey.” He breaks the silence. 

“Hi” you merely squeak out. You feel butterflies flutter in your stomach in anticipation for what he’s about to say.

“You look good. How’ve you been?”

“I’ve been better, I suppose. How are you?”

“About the same.” Another silence passes between the two  of you. “So who was that guy earlier?” his voice comes out a little bitter.

“I truly have no idea. I’m not even fully sure if he gave me his name.” You spill honestly. Spencer seems to let out a breath he was holding. “I like this shirt, is it new?” You move your hand close to his chest before moving it away, realizing your actions.

“Um, yeah, sort of.” He scratches his head awkwardly and you take the moment to stare at his tattoos. The ones you used to fall asleep tracing. 

“I’m sorry, Spencer.” He looks at you with sad eyes and nods slightly, his eyes locking on something.

“Hey, you. Thought you left.” The guy from earlier comes up behind you and puts his hands on your waist. You look a little startled at the touch but you let it be. 

“Hey. Um, This is Spencer.” Your tone screams uncomfortable and Spencer’s jaw tightens. 

“Hey, dude.” “Hey, man. I think you’re making her uncomfortable.” You bite your lip at his bluntness and you feel the man’s grip tighten slightly. You try to slip out of his hold but he doesn’t let go. “Dude, she obviously doesn’t want you. Give it up.” The man goes to fight back but you push away again and he gets the hint. 

“Sorry, man” he puts his hands up and walks away. Spencer scoffs and steps closer to you, putting a hand on your shoulder.

“You okay?” Your breath catches a little and you just nod in response. “I didn’t like how that guy had his hands on you all night. He seems so annoying.” you smirk a little, catching the jealousy in his voice.

“You know, not so long ago you were the annoying one who couldn’t keep your hands off me.” You smile at him and he laughs a little.

“Well at least you could remember my name!” a moment passes and you notice how close you are, your hand on his chest. He watches your gaze move from him to your hand and back to him. “He didn’t deserve to be so close to you when you look this damn good.” His voice dropped and it sent a shiver down your spine. 

“Are you just gonna tell me how good I look or are you gonna show me? Make your move.” You tempt him, trying to navigate where this will go next. His brows raise in shock and he recovers quickly, moving his hand to your face and leaning towards you. 

“What’s your angle here?” He’s so close to you and your brain takes a second to figure out what he actually said.

“Let’s have ourselves a little bit of fun?” You lean in further and finally meet his lips. You only allow it to be chaste and you spin around and start leading him out the door. He stays still, stunned for a moment before following you right out the door. “Hurry or I’ll be in another man’s jeans!” you tease.

[gingerale13]

I churned this out so fast excuse the quality.. anyways there's a cheesy ass note to my mutuals + followers under the cut bc I love you guys 🧡🧡

This year kinda whizzed by for me! A lot happened in my personal life that I don't want to share online, but throughout all of the highs and lows I was always able to come back to this wonderful fandom. It's been a huge comfort seeing other people theorize and discuss my favorite characters!

I've meet a lot of awesome people through Tumblr & Ao3, cosplaying, and various TF2 groups. As of writing this post I've got a solid 260 followers, which is an insane number to me when this blog simply started as a place to organize my creative works 😭

All of the little tags and comments on my stuff have seriously kept my life whimsical (for lack of a better term) and I would like to shout-out some notable people and works that kept me going through 2024!

First up, and probably the biggest one, is the lovely @aussie-bookworm and their fic, Going Through The Motions. These updates seriously made my day, and I couldn't have been happier you accepted my offer to proofread. It's been super fun discussing the differences between our countries, yapping about the Mercs, and different AUs. I hope to read many more of your works in 2025 B)

Next, another fanfic author, is AhChunta! If you like slow burns, mystery, and Speeding Bullet, I would really recommend Stolen Pieces. It's a super cool crime boss AU that I've been enjoying this year. Plus it deserves more attention!

Another awesome artist is @800db-cloud, who is honestly CARRYING the Freak Fortress fandom. I love how silly your depictions of those freaks are 🧡 and also YOUR ARTSTYLE IS SO COOL AND SATISFYING TO LOOK AT ARGHHH.. You're just super awesome 👍 also shout-out to @riskreward1, my chillest mutual. I think your Getting Milk comic series is hilarious and amazing, but seeing all of those other fandoms you draw is like a gateway drug to me because it's drawn in your KICKASS artstyle‼️plus you like The Mountain Goats and that's based

@thechocolatearmor!! The other Medic Cosplayer I met at my first con!! My friends still mention the in-character convo we had, you were hilarious and I'm so glad I got your Tumblr because I love reading all of your takes on reblogs. I hope I see you again so we can be insane together again 🔥

also @mikimel, I admire how silly you are 😭 I still have that little doodle you drew at the con, and I wish your Tomodochi Miis well <3 AND THE SOLLY FIGURE. He's beautiful. Your fashion sense is fire, and I hope to see more of your cosplay projects! :0 (specifically Soldier Miku. If that's still a thing hehe)

@ivvyzzspark you. You know what you did.

Another HUGE thanks to my very very patient proofreader @emiette for helping me make Crates readable! Em dashes are my new favorite form of punctuation.

And lastly I would like to thank @mvabank because you were the one who made me start rotting over TF2 in the first place 🫶 Magmas were always so fun with you and the image of your little sona with the big ass eyes is forever seared into my brain <3

Maybe it's because 2025 is divisible by 5, but I have a feeling this year is going to be a good one. Stay safe out there, people! Cheers 🥂

[diminuel]

I said I'd try to write a little companion piece/ continuation to my Luffy time traveling into the past to meet a young Crocodile comic!

As a warning: I know nothing about ships and since this is just a little no pressure project to try to get out of writer's block I didn’t do a lot of research. There is also a plot discrepancy because Luffy mentions Bonney and her abilities which he shouldn’t know based on the frame story I’ve given this fic *lol* Also: I don't know how to write these characters yet.

No beta, sorry for mistakes.

This is a Crocodad AU fic of course! ♥

--

Maybe This Time Part 1 (3.5k)

“Better get down from there, Luffy!” Nami called from the upper deck. “I don’t quite trust these clouds.” Luffy turned to look over his shoulder, feet dangling over the railing. Nami stood with a hand over her brow, looking up at the sky. Luffy turned back to look out at the sea and tilted his head up. The sky had a pretty green hue, nearly blending seamlessly into a dark mist rising above them. A huge dark cloud had formed ahead, casting a shadow over the sea in the distance.

“Just-“

He titled forward, lost his grip on the railing. A swooping feeling of falling tickled his stomach but before he could make a surprised sound he hit the surface of the water. It felt like he was crashing through glass.

And then it was dark.

This wasn’t the first time Luffy woke up after having been tossed into the water, but for some reason he was bone dry. And oddly thirsty.

“Thirsty,” he wheezed, sticking out his tongue to escape the uncomfortable dryness of his mouth.

A small barrel with a straw was held out to him with a curt “here.” Luffy’s attention zeroed in on the offering and he grabbed it without second-thought. A couple of deep gulps of the water later he felt a lot better already. He heaved a sigh in relief. He took the straw into his mouth again, starting a thank you as he turned towards his savior.

Startled, he sucked in water and spit it out again before he could choke on it, right into the face of someone who looked shockingly familiar.

“BABA?!” Luffy yelled. The person in front of stared at him blanky, the water dripping off his face.

Luffy stared right back. Could it be? This wasn’t Baba as he knew him, but much younger. Sure, they hadn’t seen each other in a couple of months, but he couldn’t change that much, right? But who else could it be? The same hair, the same eyes, the same scar, the same unimpressed expression.

A thousand questions rampaged through Luffy’s minds. How was Baba here? Last they had talked he had been still on Buggy’s homebase. Had he saved him? Where was his crew? What kind of island was this? But one question seemed most important.

“Why are you so young?!” Luffy asked, staring at Baba who couldn’t be much older than Luffy was now.

“Huh?”

“Was it Bonney?” The confusion on Baba’s face only grew.

“Who?” he asked. Luffy stared back at him taking in the complete lack of recognition on Baba’s face.

What?

“Don’t you recognize me, Baba?!” Luffy shouted in horror. The corners of Baba’s mouth twitched and his brows drew down. At least that was a marginally more familiar expression on his face.

“My name isn’t Baba,” he insisted. “And no. Should I?” That hit Luffy like Grandpa’s fist of love.

“Yes!!” Luffy argued, feeling overwhelmed and his crew wasn’t even here to help figure this out. Robin or Jinbei would know what to do! Luffy looked at the sea. It was overcast, the sun faint, the air cool. It was most likely early morning. There wasn’t a single ship visible in the bay or beyond. No other people on this beach. He could feel tears form in his eyes.

“What is going on?” he yelled.

--

There were rules for unexpected situations that had been drilled into his head at an early age. Get yourself out of any immediate danger. Figure out where your people are and regroup. Figure out where you are. Eat. Everything else can wait until after you’ve eaten.

Maybe the importance placed on food was just the Monkey family’s way of dealing with problems, but Luffy wasn’t about to complain. The perfectly grilled meat and the little stick that was loaded with huge mushrooms helped to dampen the anxious pit in his stomach. But the moment he looked up and caught a glimpse of the person sitting across from him, tearing the meat straight off the bone in an unsettling lack of finesse, he felt like he was being dunked into sea water again.

Just what was going on here? Luffy had been travelling with his crew, enjoying that exhilarating part of adventuring where you were simply sailing, facing the challenges the sea of the New World threw at you, not yet knowing where the path would take you. And then the next thing he knew he was plunged into water, sank, blacked out.

Nothing after made any sense. Because the person that had saved him…

“You’re staring.” Luffy startled at the unsettlingly unfamiliar voice. He watched the person opposite him pick his teeth. “Do I really look like that Baba person?” Maybe a smart man would keep his mouth shut and Luffy had been raised to have at least a pinch of common sense between his ears but…

Just what was he supposed to do when a young version of his father was sitting opposite him?!

“You do,” he settled on saying, wary. Baba didn’t look particularly upset by his lack of an explanation, not even a hint of annoyance pinching his brow. And that was unusual too.

What was this? A hallucination? Someone’s devil fruit power? Actual time travel?

(And why not into the future so Luffy could at least see cool robots shooting lasers?)

“What did you say your name was?” Baba asked, genuinely curious, then he pointed at the food in Luffy’s hands. “More where that came from,” he promised. “Eat.” And wasn’t that just another strange thing? Why was he so nice to him if he didn’t even know who Luffy was? Luffy stuffed the food in his mouth, chewing morosely.

“Monkey D. Luffy. I’m going to be the pirate king,” he announced, though far more subdued than he usually was when introducing himself. Baba’s eyebrow lifted.

“There’s no such thing as a king of pirates,” he said, chuckling to himself. “Isn’t that the whole point? The freedom?” Luffy swallowed his food, tilting his head in confusion. Baba put his elbow on his knee, and propped his chin in his palm. He grinned at Luffy, the expression open and joyful, almost mischievous. “That’s why I set sail. I want to do things for myself, see what I can achieve on the Grandline!” His grin softened to an expression a lot more familiar to Luffy though he couldn’t exactly place it. “A big adventure before…,” he trailed off and sat up straight, still grinning but not sharing his thoughts.

It was strange to hear Baba talk of freedom and piracy like that. While Baba had given Ace, Sabo and him a lot of practical information on what to expect out of piracy, he almost never talked about how it used to be for him when he just starting out. Luffy didn’t know when he became a pirate, what motivated him or why he gave up that freedom for a warlord position.

He just knew that nowadays everything, even freedom, was shackled by conditions upon conditions. A thousand locks for Baba and Dad to pick before it could be achieved. Luffy had never quite understood it. Freedom was so easy to achieve if you just pushed your boat off the shore.

Maybe this Baba still trusted that freedom was always within reach.

“How old are you?” Luffy blurted out, putting aside the unease about the situation to admit a little bit of curiosity. Even if it was a hallucination or the work of a very capable impostor, he wanted to know more about him. He wanted to know everything about him.

“19,” Baba answered. “And you?”

“Uh, me too,” Luffy said, then lifted his fingers. “46 minus 19.”

“27,” Baba answered right away, chewing on a mushroom. It seems Baba hadn’t yet discovered the “don’t talk with your mouth full” rule.

“27 years?” Luffy repeated in dawning horror, touching his palms to his cheeks. “I’m 27 years in the past?!” He whined and let himself drop onto his back. He stared up at the overcast sky, partially visible through the sparse trees here so close to the shore. How was that possible?! Did they sail into some sort of mystical area of the Grandline and were now all scattered across time? Was that even possible?

Baba’s face appeared in his field of vision, blocking out the sky.

“What are you talking about?” he wanted to know, his hands in his hips as he bent down to study Luffy. “You can’t seriously believe that you’re from the future.”

“But I am!” Luffy insisted and jumped to his feet. Luckily Baba straightened quickly enough to not be hit by Luffy’s head. He grimaced, momentarily distracted by the fact that even now his father was nearly a head taller than him. He shrugged it off. “I know that there is no known devil fruit that will grant the user the ability to go back in time. But there has got to be an explanation for this!”

“Other than you being insane?” Baba offered but judged by his tone and the grin stretching his lips he was teasing, not mocking. Luffy groaned, then crossed his arms over his chest. “You do realize that what you’re saying is improbable.”

“But it’s still true!” Baba didn’t react to his outburst. “I’ve seen a lot of so-called improbable things before! Islands with dinosaurs! Islands that fly in the sky! Islands where people turned into living toys!” Baba lifted his eyebrows at that. Luffy waved him off. “It was just Mingo, don’t worry about it.”

“I’m not worrying about it,” Baba answered, amusement evident. “But it seems like you’ve already travelled a bit. I thought you were new to the Grandline. You look like a rookie.”

“I’m not!” Luffy protested then pointed his thumb at his chest. “I’ve been on the Grandline for 2 years! I’ve got an amazing ship and the best crew in the world!” At the mention of his crew his spirits sunk like an anchor. He hoped they were okay…!

“Where were you when you got separated from your crew? You can’t have been washed ashore from that far away,” Baba asked. Luffy hummed, trying to remember. He scratched his head.

“We’d been on sea for about three weeks after Wano,” he said. “But we hadn’t come into stable climate yet, so I don’t think we were close to an island.”

“Wano,” Baba repeated. “You were in the New World?” He seemed surprised now. Was he doubting him again?

“You’re in the New World too,” Luffy shot back.

“No! We’re on Agaricus,” Baba insisted. Luffy squinted at him. Where had he heard that name before? He was sure he had heard Baba mention it. “The next big island you might have heard of is Alabasta.” Luffy hit his balled fist into his palm in recognition.

“The autumn island where you like to go mushroom hunting!” he said then the words registered. “What?! We’re in the first half of the Grandline?!” Baba looked about as shocked as Luffy felt.

“How do you know that?” he asked and it took a moment for Luffy to realize that he looked wary all of a sudden, his stance a lot less relaxed. Luffy knew that he should be able to defend himself against a 19-year-old version of his father, but he still didn’t want to test that hypothesis if Baba actually started to believe that Luffy was a threat.

“I told you! I’m from the future! I know you!” Luffy defended himself. Baba frowned at him, but his stance shifted just a bit. A soft sound at Luffy’s feet made him look down just to see tendrils of sand slip back down on the floor. He hadn’t even realized that Baba must have manipulated the sand to grab him if needed. When Luffy looked up Baba’s expression was serious, a crease between his eyebrows.

“27 years into the future,” Baba affirmed. “When you and your crew sailed the New World. As apparently I do too.” He rubbed his arms, his face uncertain for the first time. “I’m still alive in 27 years?”

“Obviously!” Luffy insisted, angry at the suggestion that Baba would not make it on the Grandline. “You’re strong!” A small grin appeared on Baba’s face.

“Yeah? So how do we know each other? Am I your captain or something?” Luffy wrinkled his nose but at the same time Baba did too. “Do I insist on everybody calling me Baba like fucking Whitebeard wants everyone to call him Pops?” Baba made a disgusted expression at that. Luffy of course knew that Baba and Whitebeard had history, but as most things of his father’s past, this was something he kept close to his chest. Sometimes his secrecy was quite annoying and it was hard to pretend not to care about what had happened, especially since the old man had meant so much to Ace.

“How can you already have a grudge against Whitebeard at 19?”

“Oh, so you don’t know everything, Monkey D. Luffy,” Baba said, his grim look dropping quickly at the supposed upper hand he fancied himself to have. Luffy wasn’t used to these quick mood changes. Still, instead of answering he grimaced. “What?”

“I don’t like when you call me by my full name. You only do that when you’re scolding me. Call me Luffy or Strawhat.”

“Strawhat?” Baba asked, laughing. Luffy pulled his hat from his back and put it onto his head demonstratively. “And you let me scold you? What am I? Your mom?” Luffy pressed his lips together, the question feeling like someone had upended a bucket of cold water onto his head. But Baba laughed in amusement as if the thought was absurd. “Am I your captain?”

For the first time a different kind of worry made a home in Luffy’s mind. He had arguably no experience in time traveling but he wondered if it was a good idea to let his father know too much. Could Luffy change the past just by being here? Could he change his own present if he messed up here?

Luffy knew that he was a “happy accident.” What if he told Baba who he was and Baba decided to be a bit more careful so that no happy accidents happened accidentally? That’d be horrible! Would Luffy just disappear?! Maybe this was the true danger of this situation!

“You’re not my captain! I’m the captain of my ship!” Luffy insisted, pride in his position winning out over the moment of panic.

“Then what’s our connection?” Crocodile asked and took a step closer to Luffy, a glint in his eyes that Luffy didn’t quite like. He didn’t have a sharp hook to hold under his nose but he had a sharp and menacing grin. “Spit it out, Strawhat.”

“I… I don’t know anything!” Luffy said through pursed lips, looking away. But other than grab him and shake him or worse (as Luffy had seen Baba do to people who annoyed him or lied to him) Baba just blinked at him. Then he threw his head back and laughed.

“I know someone who’s just as horrible as you are at lying!” he said. Luffy wrinkled his nose. Not everyone could lie professionally. “But why don’t you want to tell me?”

“Because I am from the future!” Luffy insisted. “What if I say something that changes something big?! I don’t want that! I like my life! Maybe if someone sent me into this past, this is their objective?! What if they’re trying to kill me by letting me make a mistake here in the past that leads to me not being born?!”

“That seems far too much effort,” Baba said, looking Luffy up and down. “You don’t look particularly strong, Strawhat,” he said his tone annoyingly patronizing. “A stray bullet could kill you.”

“What?! I am strong! And my bounty is higher than yours!” he protested. Luffy would never have said that to his Baba’s face but this young version of him was different. “And I’m not going to tell you what it is!” Baba rolled his eyes.

“At least tell me I didn’t choose something as stupid as Baba as my name,” he said, then he moved his hand and a wave of sand spread over the fire they had roasted their food on, dousing it at once.

“I’ve always done my best to fly under the marine’s radar and it’s hard to break the habit. I haven’t really gotten my name out there yet,” Baba continued. He pointed at Luffy. “But I will! The world will soon hear of the exploits of Crocodile!” Luffy stared at him, taking in his wide, confident grin.

Baba looked impossibly young.

“Yes,” Luffy agreed, not sure why there was a lump in his throat. Baba smiled at him, then he reached out to pat Luffy’s shoulder. “Let’s go.” Baba turned around and started packing up the rest of the cooked meat and mushrooms. He tossed Luffy a bag, then shouldered his own. When he walked away from the camp, Luffy trailed after him.

“Where are we going?” he asked. They stepped out of the outskirts of the forest and back onto the beach. There was a small ship docking on a pier that Luffy hadn’t noticed back when he had first woken up. It wasn’t much bigger than the one Luffy had initially set out on. Far too small for a crew of more than two. Not a vessel that looked suited for the Grandline.

“You’re looking for your crew, right? And a way to get back home, wherever and whenever that might be,” Baba said and then thrust his thumb behind him, towards the ship. “So what do you say, Strawhat Luffy? Want to join me?” Luffy looked at him in surprise. Baba wasn’t exactly the kind of person to make such generous offers to strangers, at least he wasn’t today.

“Fine. But I’m captain!” Luffy said and extended his arm to grab onto the ship’s mast. He pulled himself onto the ship, Baba staring after him. Luffy sat himself down at the helm of the ship. Baba cursed to himself, then undid the rope and gave his ship a powerful shove with his foot. He turned into sand and landed on the ship next to Luffy.

“No way! This is my ship!” Luffy looked up the mast, noticing the lack of a pirate flag.

“Baba-“

“Don’t call me that.”

“Crocodile, you don’t even have a pirate flag!” he said disapprovingly and for the first time Baba actually seemed embarrassed. “Does your ship have name at least?”

“Yeah, it’s the Mind Your Own Business Strawhat!” Crocodile went down into the cabin and then came back with an eternal pose. Luffy couldn’t read the name written on it. Crocodile walked to the steering wheel and then looked up at the sail. Luffy watched as sand spread from Crocodile’s body until the sails were lifted and caught the wind.

“Where are we going?” Luffy asked, inspecting the stemhead but it didn’t seem particularly comfortable to sit on. Crocodile’s ship didn’t even have a figurehead! Maybe he had a banana in his galley so Luffy could put it on the stemhead. The "Mind your Own Business Strawhat" needed least some decoration. Momentarily caught up in his musings, it took him a moment to turn back around to look up at Crocodile behind the wheel. It was strange seeing him there. He had only sailed with Crocodile on the same ship once, leaving Impel Down. He didn’t know why it seemed so strange to see him man a ship himself. He knew that his father was a pirate and yet it seemed odd to realize what that actually meant. That he hadn’t always been a warlord who tended to stay in one place or travel on marine vessels, that he hadn’t always had 2000 people under his command, that he hadn’t always been an emperor’s commander. But he looked comfortable behind the wheel, like he had never done anything else.

“Do you want to go all the way to Wano?” Luffy eventually asked and jumped up to where Crocodile was. “What about your own adventure? Don’t you want to follow the log poses and do your route around the Grandline?”

“I don’t mind making a detour,” he easily said as if it wasn’t difficult at all for him to give up his plans. “And absolutely not, I’m not going to sail into the blue like that just based on your last location in allegedly 27 years from now” Crocodile said with a scoff. “We need information.” He smiled down at the log pose. “And I might have an idea where we could get it.”

To be continued? If you find it too hard to read on here I can post it on AO3.

[bonefall]

BONES WHERE ARE YOU

I'm here I'm okay! Sorry I went radio silent for like two months LMAO I've been a busy boygirl.

I have been doing A LOT of things. The embarrassing truth is that I noticed I was going a while without posting, figured I'd stay quiet a little longer so I'd have fun stuff to share to "make up" for the fact I was quiet, but then things got delayed and I felt guilty I had nothing to show for being gone so long, and before I knew it it was like 2 months. Girl help

I've always got a ridiculous amount of irons in the fire, but mainly 3 big things have been keeping me quiet;

Thing 1 is, unfortunatly, a super secret, non-WC related game project. You have NO idea how badly I want to blabber about this, but my team asked me not to :///

It's so fucking cool and I've been working so hard on it. I have been able to research so many cool environments and cultures. OHH my god, did you have any idea that Iran has cloud forests?? Or that you can trace Mayan trade routes based on the color of obsidian you find in archeological sites??? I want to spill beans so bad.

Hopefully we'll make more progress on this project in a few months and then I can share details, but at the moment I'm honor-bound to silence OTL

THING 2 I've been doing is graduating college and finding a good job, which naturally is time consuming. I finally did though, so hopefully I'll have some cash to burn soon on commissions and such. I actually have a couple Clan Culture posts essentially completed as drafts, but I want them illustrated before releasing them.

Aaaand THING 3 is that I started playing the demo for an Indie game called Critter Cove. I apologize that this reason's kind of mundane, but it is only a demo for what the devs call "the first 2 hours of the game" and I've already got 40 hours logged.

It's a good game, man. I'm obsessed with the character creator. It's got fat bodies, squid-faced options, hyena ears, lots of tails, even TVhead options, everything. The devs are also super responsive on the Discord. I have made so many fun designs lmaooo.

It releases into Early Access on the 10th and you save your progress into the main game. It's like Animal Crossing meets Windwaker. Can't recommend it enough if you're into these sorts of games.

TL;DR I've been up to non-WC things.

Doesn't mean I'm gone though! I'll be back soon. As soon as I have some time, I'm going to catch up on the Ivypool's Heart stuff so I can formulate an opinion about it.

[redsugarx]

青白之魅 3: Hair & Makeup Styling

1 Introduction & Presentation // 2 Background & Influences // 3 Hair & Makeup // 4 Set Design // 5 Clothes & Accessories // 6 Conclusion

If you thought there was gonna be less nerd from here on out you are deeply mistaken.

I was responsible for the hair styling for both the white and green snake, which was super fun. I’ve been doing hanfu hair styling for a year or two now (thank you to everyone who let me practice on them!!!) and have gradually gotten better at it, even though I still struggle with some parts of it. I certainly have the equipment collection to show for it now at least! I have so many fake hair pieces I can’t keep track.

As with any hanfu hair styling, the process involved a lot of fake hair, pins, and hairspray—but of course before the actual styling started, which was mostly only on the day of, I had to spend some time thinking about how I wanted the hair to look on each character.

元 衛九鼎 洛神圖, Taiwan National Palace Museum, 她：女性形象與才藝，2020

As far as snake-like hairstyles go, the first thing that comes to mind is the 靈蛇髻/��蛇髻/ling2 she2 ji4/Spirited Snake hairstyle, shown above on Luoshen, a women’s hairstyle that went through a lot of changes through the dynasties but generally involved a tall, twisting bun leaning slightly to the side on the top of the head, resembling the body of a rearing snake. It’s a very popular style both historically and among hanfu enthusiasts today, because it looks very unique and ethereal. Often, female spirits or goddesses are depicted with this hairstyle.

That was the style I was originally planning on using, but it came with some limitations: one, it’s kind of… in unstable equilibrium? We’d essentially be walking around with the leaning tower of Pisa around on top of our heads. I had to style both of our heads BEFORE setting up the set design, so there was too high of a risk that something would get knocked out of place, since I knew I would have to be running around doing things. Also, because Yulan has brightly colored dyed hair, she had to wear a black base wig under all the fake hair pieces, which is a bit more difficult to pin things to than your actual scalp.

So instead I went with a different design. I knew I still wanted a lot of serpentine loops and strands, and I wanted there to be a significant amount of volume going on—they are ‘spirits’ and ‘goddesses’ after all, they deserve to be fancy!—so I went from there.

The Poetry Vibes

I stumbled upon a few poems last year while looking for names for Cloud9 Hanfu’s Year of the Dragon collection, and a few of them ended up becoming inspirations for this project.

This is the first part of 張可久 (Zhang Kejiu)’s Yuan Dynasty verse, 醉太平·春情 (Drunken Peace · Spring Romance). It’s a bittersweet poem describing a speaker that is longing for a lost love, likening her beauty to the imagery of the evening spring showers outside his home. I’ll do a slightly more faithful line-by-line translation of the poem’s actual words, then a paragraph-form translation with more stylization that gets at the meaning a little more (poetry is really hard to translate).

This is mostly just my interpretation though, and my Classical Chinese is... extremely questionable, so like... take it with a grain of salt.

張可久 Zhang Kejiu, 百度百科

Line-By-Line

烏雲髻鬆，金鳳釵橫。<- “Storm cloud hair is soft and loose, the golden phoenix hairpin is horizontal.”

伯勞飛燕自西東，惱離愁萬種。<- “The shrikes and swallows fly their ways to the West and the East, causing ten thousand kinds of sorrowful goodbyes.”

碧溶溶满溪綠水桃源洞，淡濛濛半窗白月梨雲夢，恨匆匆一簾紅雨杏花風。<- “Jade stream water flows to the Peach Blossom Grotto, moonlight is cast cloudily through the pear blossoms to my half-open window as if through a dream; the wind is unforgiving, felling apricot petals like a red curtain of rain.”

把青春斷送。<- “It ruins the spring.”

Stylized

Storm clouds gather loosely outside my window. I can almost imagine that they are strands of her soft hair; I can almost see where her golden phoenix hairpin would have laid, nestled in her black locks.

It’s springtime now—the orioles should be migrating, flying to their summer homes in the west, and the swallows to the east. Imagining their inevitable parting stirs a complicated sorrow in my chest.

As it storms, clear rainwater collects on the ground in rivulets, streaming away like liquid jade. I wonder where the water is going—is it to some forgotten, untouchable paradise? Is that where she is now? I can see through my half-open window where moonlight drizzles through the petals of the pear-blossom trees, misty and clouded as if I’m dreaming. Suddenly, a curtain of red petals fall across my vision like rain: it’s my flowering apricot tree, struck by the wind.

My trance is broken—spring is over.

//

As Chinese poetry tends to be, it’s very romantic with lots of natural imagery, tinged with sadness. When I reread it with this project in mind, it made me think of Xu Xian after the events of the Legend of the White Snake. While it’s commonly accepted that Bai Suzhen later ends up getting freed and there’s some kind of happy ending, the actual legend itself ends with the White Snake being imprisoned under the Leifeng Pagoda. Many years, if not centuries, pass before she gets out. So as many Chinese romances tend to be, the Legend of the White Snake is, by itself, a great tragedy. I can see the Xu Xian as the speaker of the poem.

Bearing this in mind, I imagine that the beauty of the Snake Spirits are much like the scene described in this poem—soft and ethereal like mist, hiding enough power to bend nature to their will.  I decided to lean into the ‘clouds’ theme, especially for Bai Suzhen.

傳 五代 周文矩 仕女圖, Taiwan National Palace Museum, 她：女性形象與才藝，2020 (ft fucked up fat cat)

The comparison of women‘s hairstyles to rainclouds is actually very widespread in Chinese literature, so it was perfect for hairstyle inspiration—in poetry, women are often represented by their features, ex. a poem might say "moth brows" or "cloud hair" to refer to a beautiful lady. Cloud hair and cultivated appearance is integral to the allure of a woman, so much so that the act of putting on makeup can be considered a transformation of identity.

In the linked instance the transformation of identity is supposed to be in the sense of gender identity, but you could also see it (in the context of this project) as the transformation from snakes to women.

This connection is strengthened by another poem, 好事近·夢中作 by 秦觀/Qin Guan from the Song Dynasty.

清宫殿藏画本. 北京: 故宫博物馆出版社. 1994, Wikimedia Commons

Line-By-Line

春路雨添花，花動一山春色。<- “Rain has filled the road with flowers, swaying in the breeze, filling the mountain with the feel of spring.”

行到小溪深處，有黃鸝千百。<- “I walked far along the mountain stream, where there were hundreds and thousands of yellow orioles.”

飛雲當面化龍蛇，夭矯轉空碧。<- “The flying clouds turned into dragons and snakes before me, stretching across the vast jade expanse.”

醉臥古藤陰下，了不知南北。<- “I lay down, drunk in the shade of the vines, not knowing which way is North or South.”

Stylized

I see where the spring showers have filled the mountainside with flowers. They sway in the breeze, bringing with them the rejuvenating scent of spring as I walk deeper and deeper into nature, following the bubbling mountain spring and the crowds of yellow orioles that have come out to celebrate the season as well. As I look up at the sky, I see dragons and snakes form in the midst of the roiling clouds above, leaping and coiling across the expanse of the clear blue sky. Intoxicated, I stop to rest underneath some vines, lost in the beauty of springtime.

//

So I am aware that it kind of sounds like this guy miiiiight be on acid but I'm pretty sure it doesn’t mean he’s hallucinating snakes in the clouds, it’s just like when you look at a cloud and say “that one looks like an elephant!”

Then again there is an interpretation that says his "walking further and further into nature" means he's just getting more and more drunk to escape his problems, so like... make of that what you will. Art is more often than not subjective.

Anyway, dragons also have power over rain and weather, and snakes are often called the ‘little dragon,’ often also associated with flowing water. All this is to say—clouds & coils are good representations of snakes! Also, you’ll notice that both of these poems are about springtime (though the second one is noticeably happier), fitting in with using this project to welcome the Spring Festival :)

Moving onto individual hairstyles. Keeping in mind the shapes of clouds, I wanted Bai Suzhen’s hair to be very tall, voluminous and ethereal to represent her spiritual prowess and strong will. A bunch of loops fan out at the top center of the hairstyle, adding ‘rays’ pointing outwards like a halo. I made sure there were a lot of round, circular elements to ‘fluff out’ the shape like a cloud. There are two strands of circles kind of peeking out at the bottom behind her neck/ears area, which were achieved by pinning a braid to each side and then pulling the outermost hair strands of each ‘loop’ outwards to create little flat circles.

Going back to the first poem, if I imagine that the speaker is Xu Xian thinking of Bai Suzhen, it makes sense for the mentioned ‘gold hairpin’ to appear in her hairstyle, doesn’t it? So I also added a few gold hair accessories—U-shaped pins for the most part, plus a small guan in the center to tie things together—to point outwards above her head. 

For Xiaoqing's hair, I wanted something that was a little more youthful, but still resplendent enough to do her justice. Xiaoqing is a younger spirit than Bai Suzhen, but still accomplished in her own right. Her hairstyle don’t extend as far outwards as the White Snake’s, but she has two ‘loop’ buns on each side rather than one peak in the middle. It’s kind of evocative of the double bun look often styled on younger girls, but with more fancy loops and swirls added to represent her high spiritual abilities. Each of the two main buns has two strands of hair looping up from the back of the head to the top. The strands are very loose, so depending on how I moved, they separated into several visible strands/just one thicker lock of hair.

The hair accessories I chose for Xiaoqing don’t have as much metal in them, to distinguish her from her sister, as I wanted to emphasize her connection to nature—because she has less experience than Bai Suzhen, she is often portrayed in media (Green Snake 1993 especially) as not yet reaching full human form, still closer to her serpentine origins. She has a white flower with green leaves on each side, standing for spring, youthfulness, and her dedication to the White Snake. There are a couple strands of pearls ‘dripping’ down from the flowers like raindrops, matching with the pearl accessories in the makeup, as well as with the white markings on Dragun’s back.

傳 唐 周昉 內人雙陸圖 , Taiwan National Palace Museum, 她：女性形象與才藝，2020

I also chose to include a pair of green half-moon combs, made to imitate jade (they’re acrylic, I’m working on a budget here ;-;). These were often worn several at a time, inserted into different layers of hair (as seen in the image above). Jade accessories are carved from nature—they are often subject to the colorings and properties of the natural base material they are made from, and they are often used to describe natural imagery. This can sometimes be a limitation, but for those who look further it can be an inspiration (see the Jadeite Cabbage, my favorite thing ever, Taiwan Numba One).

Peking Opera Hairstyles

京劇旦角，百度百科

Peking opera influenced the hairstyle design a lot. Dan roles (旦角）in opera have very specific hairstyle protocols. They wear a lot of fake hair pieces and hair accessories just like modern hanfu hairstyles have. One of the base hair silhouettes shared by almost all dan is the traditional 大頭/大头/da4 tou2/'big head,' with most of the hair wound into a large oval bun on the back of the head, and small pieces added at the edges for decoration. To imitate this look, the back of both of the hairstyles are padded with a large, flat, and round hairpiece (known in the hanfu hairstyling community as the 西瓜包/xi1 gua1 bao1/'watermelon bun'). This helps to add volume onto the back of the head, creating the illusion of very long hair that has been neatly wrapped and pinned up.

Another one of the key parts of these hairstyles is the round loop of hair in the center of the forehead. It’s an important feature that I included to tie the two styles together, to make sure it was clear that it was a ‘matched set’ so to speak, and was inspired by the hair loops seen in Chinese Opera styling.

戏曲旦角化妆、梳大头全过程，新浪博客，2011

Traditionally, a solution made from elm tree sap and/or kelp was used as hair gel to glue the little contouring base pieces (貼片子/tie1 pian4 zi0) down to the face. Seven loops called 小灣/小湾/xiao3 wan1/'little curves' line the hairline, one in the center and three off to the sides. I think they look kind of similar to the hairstyle that ballroom dancers have.

This was an artsy hanfu concept shoot, so I didn’t want to necessarily copy the operatic hairstyles—not to mention I don't know how, the motion of making one hair loop alone can take 3-5 years to train—but I did want to include some elements of the opera characters as a nod to their role in popularizing the legend! So each hair design has that central loop. It’s a separate hair piece that I bought for this shoot, whose base I covered with some of the other hair. It isn't glued down like it would be traditionally. I was going to have a few more loops coming down on the sides too, but I found that it looked kind of awkward so I took them off.

There are also two thin strands of hair trailing down each shoulder, another element partially inspired by Chinese opera styling, but it’s very common nowadays to have those there just for the Vibes so it’s not as unique. Most dan roles have a section of long unbound hair trailing down their backs, with two small strands separated out to stream down the front. This is called 線尾/线尾/xian4 yi3/'thread tail' or 線簾/线帘/xian4 lian2/'thread curtain.'

Makeup

Okay so this mostly ended up being about hair rather than makeup because I know a lot more about hair than makeup, but I'll talk a bit about the makeup too lol. I can't speak for the White Snake's makeup—Yulan was in charge of that and she did a marvelous job!—but I did do my own makeup.

The makeup for the green snake came with a great challenge: how do you make my face, arguably the roundest and most nonthreatening thing you’ve ever seen, into something resembling a snake demoness? Also, flamboyant makeup in cool colors can be tricky—too little and it’ll all disappear on camera, too much and it’ll look like a muddy green mess.

Both my sister and I are fairly warm-toned; green has to be very concentrated in a very small area to look interesting, otherwise it just looks like a bruise (I tried it). So I tried to use a lot of long thin lines of color and angles in the eyeshadow to avoid that, and to kind of draw out the snakey vibes. The meager selection of green eyeshadows that I had weren't the most pigmented, so we made a stop at Sephora (my first time in Sephora believe it or not) on the way from LAX to Riverside and bought some supplies. They turned out to be super super useful.

One of my favorite makeup features was a my sister’s suggestion—fake pearl ‘snake bite’ piercings under the bottom lip! It’s a fun little linguistic easter egg that I’m super happy to have been able to incorporate into her styling. 

宋人 宋高宗后坐像，Taiwan National Palace Museum, 她：女性形象與才藝，2020 Look closely and you'll see dozens of tiny women depicted in pointillism on her guan headdress!

Pearl makeup （珍珠花鈿/珍珠花钿/zhen1 zhu1 hua1 dian4）was really popular throughout several dynasties, but especially the Song Dynasty, where it became a huge trend among nobles. Today it mostly appears in hanfu circles, but I believe some Southern Chinese opera styles use them too.

As far as I know, the position that we put them in under the bottom lip is anachronistic, but they did often appear at the corners of the mouth/the dimples (面靨/面靥/mian4 ye4), so if you stretched it a little and imagine they've just been moved slightly, I could probably claim that it's at least historically inspired.

元人 畫梅花仕女, Taiwan National Palace Museum, 她：女性形象與才藝，2020

Other places that pearl makeup often appeared was on the temples, cheeks, or forehead. I also put a pair under my eyes just for funsies (I find that using smaller-sized pearls looks better to me, even though the ones shown in paintings are usually fairly large).

//

Okay that ended up being a lot longer than I thought it would be. I am so tired wow. The next one might take a while to come out too, but hope this one was enjoyable :)

1 Introduction & Presentation // 2 Background & Influences // 3 Hair & Makeup // 4 Set Design // 5 Clothes & Accessories // 6 Conclusion

[alvfr]

you asked for it! im forcing you!

how about a scenario on that particular AU you have cooking around? between nightwing and a spiderperson that is marooned in the black and white gotham city

we love to see it

posting this like you haven't already read all of it >.< a/n: the funniest jokes are princess-marida's and she is a blessed saint that endures my long ramblings about wips, including this one. i know it says a scenario, but this turned into a longer project (shocker) so here's the first part of chapter 1 (eventual) paring: dick grayson/reader rating: m (swearing)/sfw cw: spider-woman!reader who never stops talking, no use of y/n, superhero violence summary: for years, you have been the one and only Spider-Woman of your world. However, after being recruited to the multiversal Spider-Society, you learn that there's a version of you in every other universe too.At least that's what you thought until something goes wrong and you end up in a world with plenty of superheroes, but no Spider-Man. You're stranded, alone and glitching. You need to find this world's Spider-Man and restore your link to the Spider-Verse before you disintegrate completely - easier said than done with both a local detective and a hot vigilante on your tail.

Out of the Spider-Verse (and into Gotham)

All right, guys. Let’s start at the beginning one last time. 

Your name is definitely not Peter Parker, but you were bitten by a radioactive spider, and for the last few years, you’ve been the one and only Spider-Woman. At least, you thought you were until another Spider-Woman showed up to recruit you to the multiversal Spider-Society and you realized you were one of many, many, many Spider-things from all kinds of universes. It was a sweet gig, getting you out and about some, meeting new people, doing team-ups and group work, and your leader was a decent enough guy. A little intense. Borderline scary. Easy on the eyes though. Really easy on the eyes.

And one day, you’re hanging out at the headquarters minding your own business, totally not gossipping about boss-man, when the order comes to capture one of your fellow Spider-Men. Next thing you know, you’re caught up in the whirlwind of Spider-Beings chasing after someone called Miles Morales, and somehow, in the chaos, you slip.

A fluke, really. You never slip. You’re Spider-Woman! You literally stick to walls and ceilings, and somehow, you lost your footing and took a tumble into darkness. 

Real darkness. Where bright flashing lights and psychedelic colors had accompanied you all the other times you hopped through dimensions, this time, you fell into a black pit of nothing. Reflexes had you shooting out webs, desperate to get an anchor point. They disappeared into the void with an embarrassing swish, and you did not even have time to scream before you smacked into something undeniably solid.

Concrete, probably, based on the cloud of debris and dust that rained over you as your body dug several feet into it, knocking every cubic inch of air from your lungs with an oof. Yup, you determined as you lifted your now gray arms to study them. Definitely concrete. You dropped your head back into the rubble and made a face under your mask. Concrete dust was a real bitch to get out of the suit, and you would be forced to cosplay as whitewashed Noir Spider-Man until you could get it dry-cleaned. 

Read more on AO3

[jube-art]

Would you...make more...JJ art? 🥺👉👈

sure! lmao :) a fic snippet under the cut!

Cassie breathes out, the fire inside of her makes it cloud up in the cold mountain air. She grounds herself, trying to think back on all that her Aunty Diana taught her, about containing her anger, about keeping things manageable and not lashing out at the people around her.

It’s not Cassies fault that anger runs in her family.

Deemed just a bit too ‘rough’ for the regular teen titans, she’s been given an address to go to for a team meet-up that would “fit her deposition” better.

(That the teen titans wouldn’t have a name attached too.)

It’s an old Justice League base, up here in upstate New York just outside of the Catskills and she’s just a little early. Not terribly early she doesn’t think, just about fifteen minutes from the official meeting time.

She knocks on the disguised door, the official teen titans stationary in her hands tell her exactly how to knock and where.

Sure enough, the rock wall opens up, creaking with disuse, yawning a gaping doorway into darkness.

“This is a bad idea.” She tells herself, the words make more of that cloudy air puff around her, but she moves forward into the dark anyway.

The first thing she sees is Nightwing.

Robin is here too, helping him with something just out of sight.

Involuntarily she relaxes a bit. Nobody doesn’t know who Nightwing is, he was the one who handed her the little piece of paper in the first place, telling her to come here. “Hello?”

“Oh!” Nightwing turns, shoving what he was working on down underneath the table. Robin keeps working. “Wondergirl! You’re a little early! Hello!”

Oh god. Did Cassie mess up? Should she have arrived on time? Damn it, mom, she should have left when she wanted to-!

“Welcome!” Nightwing instantly is all charming smiles and a brilliantly handsome face. He moves forward, leaving Robin to continue what he was doing. “I’m glad you decided to take a chance on this little project we wanted to start up.”

Cassie really didn’t have much of a choice did she? It was either this last ditch sort of reject project that she had no information on or it was ‘don’t be a hero’

“We’re just waiting on the other three to be ready.” Nightwing is still talking, still with that relaxed tone and smile. “They should be getting here soon. Do you want some water? We have cookies too-“

Robin jerks back. “Don’t bite me you little shit!”

Nightwing’s smile freezes on his face, awkward. “Ignore him. He’s getting one of the participants on board for this little subgroup.”

Cassie regrets everything. She’s gonna be working with somebody who bites? Who bites like a fucking child? Who is feral?!

Cassie’s all for fighting, all for war, but she’s also all for strategy, it’s in her blood. It’s apart of her power. She can’t deal with anything that’s little more than a feral beast-

Robin yanks around, bringing with him-

The boy is Cassie’s age. Black hair, a black mask over his eyes that can be nothing but one of Batman’s sort. He’s got a thick heavy and large cape on, black, going down to his ankles, pushing away from Robin with a sneer.

He’s sort of cute.

Pale face filled with freckles, thin and gaunt, a little taller than most boys Cassie’s age.

Is this- is this the new Robin?!

Cassie’s expectations of the group go way up.

“Hello?” Another voice comes from behind Cassie, causing her to turn and-

Oh my gods!

That’s! That’s Lex Luthor’s son! Dressed sharp in a form fitting leather jacket with skinny jeans and his signature thick sunglasses.

He’s got powers?!

“Ah! Superboy, so glad to see you-“

“I would rather not be called that.” The boy cuts off Nightwing, a sour expression on his face. “I would rather not be associated with that parent.”

Cassie’s mind is getting blown right now. What. What is going on?! Who is on this team?!

“Of course. I understand completely.” Nightwing’s still speaking for the bats. It looks like the older, still in the traditional uniform Robin is maneuvering the new guy to be front and center. “We’ll make a note of that going forward. Is there anything specific that you’d like to be called for now?”

The boy- superman’s son?!- just sort of looks sad now. Now that it’s been brought to attention, Cassie can’t see anybody but a younger version of Superman looking up from a punk’s face. “If I get one, I’ll let you know.”

The older Robin taps out some kind of pattern on Nightwing’s shoulder, and Nightwing taps one backwards onto Robin’s arm. They understand each other perfectly, as the older, traditional Robin goes ahead and leaves, headed to a side room with the label above it ‘Zeta’.

The new, strange, Robin (because who else is this?) sticks himself into Nightwing’s side.

The Superman … child (how?!) cocks his head at the behavior, the new Robin and him get into a weird stand off, eyes wide and unblinking. Creepy.

“Now we only have one more to wait on.” Nightwing tells the group at large. “Then after introductions we’ll discuss sort of what we have in mind for this group moving forward, and training both physically and mentally to help with both working as a team and working on handling what it takes to be a-

The concussive boom from outside makes Cassie’s ears pop. She winces at the sound, so does the kid of Superman

The bat’s both flinch, full body, jerking away physically from the noise.

The little new Robin way, way worse than Nightwing. Clinging onto Nightwing physically, off the ground and like a koala.

“That’s gonna be Impulse.” Nightwing sighs. “I thought Flash told me that they had stopped breaking the sound barrier-“

He sort of mumbles off, and the group waits a few beats in strange silence. When nothing happens for a bit, Nightwing actually reaches over to the command console and presses a button. “You have to go normal human speed, little dude.”

The group at large waits another second-

Like a flash, sure enough there’s two little wisps of a human being, one with red hair, one with blond. The two of them are wearing the same outfit, white and red, and are vibrating so hard that they are hard to get the details of.

Cassie can only see the chain that connects their wrists, tugging towards one or the other with every twitch.

It hits Cassie then, just how wild this is.

In the room right now is some powerful players, more powerful than Cassie was originally expecting when the teen titans had told her that with her … anger issues she might not be a good fit for the Titans name. Cassie expected to be thrown to the side, mad as hell, not put on a team that consisted of only power players. Batman, Superman, Flash, Wonder Woman, you couldn’t get bigger names.

And here they all sit, in some run down old base cave in New York, waiting to be told that they’re going to finally be a team.

[javiscigarette]

Bad Mood

Joel x f!reader (pre/no outbreak)

Summary: Based on this ask (thank u nonnie)!! Joel punishes bratty reader that's it

Warnings: SMUT! NSFW 18+ no use of Y/N, established relationship, straight up filth not much else, dom!Joel brat!reader, spanking, fingering, orgasm denial, oral (m receiving)

Word count: 3k

A/N: Using this as my 450 follower celebration! I'm so grateful for everyone who's followed me and enjoyed my silly little fics. I love this community <3. Also, this is relatively short but I am already planning a part two to this so stay tuned hehehe. my masterlist

Joel knew you were in a bad mood the second you walked through the door. 

The door slams behind you and carelessly toss your keys on the little entryway table. You keep your headphones on as you kick off your shoes and stomp off to the bedroom, not even bothering to look at Joel who’s sitting on the couch in the living room not even six feet away. 

Joel stays silent as he watches you stride down the hall to the bedroom, wincing just slightly when he hears the bedroom door slam shut. 

You keep your music blasting as you immediately change into your comfy clothes. Today was a horrible day at work. Your boss has been breathing down your neck for the last two weeks about a project you're working on, nitpicking every single detail and telling you to make a million changes. And today, despite all the edits and changes she told you to make, she still picked it apart, telling you that you were better off restarting the whole thing. 

And now you were left with a day and a half to “fix” this project before it’s due. So yeah, you were in a bit of a bad mood. 

After changing, it’s straight to stress cleaning. With your headphones on, you storm back into the kitchen and start to pull out all of the cleaning supplies from under the sink. Your music is loud enough that you don’t hear Joel clearing his throat behind you. You only notice that he’s there whenever you stand up and turn around. He says something to you and looks at you expectedly, forcing you to stop your music. 

“What?” you snap at him, ripping out one of your ear buds. 

Joel raises his eyebrows at you and holds up his hands in innocence.  “Do you want to talk about it?” 

Your narrow your eyes at him because how dare he interrupt you right now with his genuine love and care for you. 

“No.” you reply firmly, putting your earbud back in. 

You go to start cleaning, but Joel is saying something else before you can even pick up the rag. 

You rip your earbud out again and actually snap at him this time with a “What Joel?!”  

Joel tilts his head with his eyebrows raised, giving you a silent warning to lose the attitude. 

But the last thing you need right now is someone else telling you what to do. 

“Can I please just clean the damn kitchen in peace?” you ask, your words biting a little harder than you intended but you don’t care. 

Joel stares at you for a good five seconds, his jaw subtly shifting and clenching as he grinds his teeth. 

“Okay.”

That’s all he says before turning away and walking out of the room. 

You immediately feel a pang of guilt seeing him walk away, but the anger is quick to wash it away and cloud your head again. 

You spend the next thirty minutes scouring the kitchen from top to bottom. Every cabinet door and every drawer you open is shut with a slam and you scrub the countertops so vigorously that your arm is starting to get sore. 

Thinking he’s given you enough time, Joel comes back in, standing near you as you scrub away at the spot of burnt on food on the stovetop. You can see him in your peripheral, standing a foot or two away from you but you ignore him. You already told him to leave you alone once. 

He stands there for a few moments, trying to get you to look over at him but he eventually gives up and just takes out one of your earbuds. 

The saying “seeing red” never made much sense to you until just now. 

“What the hell, Joel!” you shout, finally turning to face him. The anger boils up inside of you and you can feel your whole body heat up you try to snatch your earbud back from him but he’s faster than you and holds it up high to where you can’t reach. 

“Joel I’m so fucking serious right now, just leave me alo-” 

Joel takes out your other earbud and tosses them to the counter behind him before you can say anything else. 

“Joel!” you nearly scream, your face red hot with anger now. 

“Quit acting like a fuckin’ brat” Joel says quietly, his tone serious and stern.

“I’m not being a fucking brat, you’re the one annoying the shit out of me right now” 

Joel’s eyes narrow, trying to mask his shock at your attitude. You’re rarely ever this angry and you almost never take it out on Joel like this. 

“Drop this attitude right now and I’ll give you one more chance and act like you didn’t just fucking say that” Joel says, his voice audibly tenser. 

You roll your eyes and reach for your earbuds again, but again, Joel is faster than you and pins your wrist to the counter with his hand. 

“Joel, just fuck off” you mutter. His grip on your wrist is so tight that your fingers are starting to tingle from the restricted blood flow. You look up at him and immediately realize how fucked you are. His face is hard as stone, a deep frown tugging at his lips while he stares holes into your own eyes. 

“Okay, baby. You want to act like a brat, I’ll treat you like a fuckin’ brat” Joel spits before tugging harshly on your wrist and dragging you out of the kitchen. 

“Joel, I am not in the mood right now” you say as he leads you to the living room, nearly pulling your arm out of socket as he does. 

“I don’t give a fuck.” Joel says firmly. He stops near the couch and release his grasp on your wrist. 

“Now get on your knees and shut that mouth up with my cock.” 

You snort at his words and laugh right in his face. 

“You think I’m going to blow you right now? You’re the one who should be apologizing to me” you snarl, accusingly poking him in the chest to emphasize your words.  

Joel is still as a rock as he stares at you again, the darkness in his eyes already starting to break down some the resolve inside of you. 

“You’re gonna regret that, baby.” Joel whispers from behind clenched teeth. 

Without another word, Joel grips your wrist once again and steps towards the couch. He sits down and pulls you until you’re standing in front of him before pulling down your shorts and panties in one go. He then pulls you down into his lap and even though you try to fight back, Joel is a lot stronger than you and easily maneuvers you until you’re on your stomach laying across his lap with your face pressed against the couch cushion and your ass in the air. Joel keeps a firm hand on the back of your neck, pinning your head to the couch with your face smushed against the cushion. 

He uses his other hand to rub your ass, the soft shorts you put on earlier easily riding up and exposing most of your skin. You try to wiggle out of his grasp but there’s no use. He’s not letting go of you now. 

“How many do you think you deserve?” Joel asks, his voice steady and calm again now that he has you like this. 

You don’t say anything, just humph and try to squirm out from underneath his hold again. Bad idea. The grip on the back of your neck tightens and then the room is filled with the loud crack of his hand coming down heavy on your ass. 

You yelp in surprise, tingles of pain radiating from the spot here he spanked you. Your determination to keep up this attitude is quickly crumbling. Joel knew exactly how to put you back in your place. 

“I think at least 10” Joel says before delivering two more harsh smacks to both cheeks. You bite back a whimper, still enough willpower to try and not let him see how affected you actually are. “Starting now.” 

Your eyes roll back, and your brows furrow deeply as he gives you another hard spank. The moan in your throat comes out through your nose as a sharp exhale as you keep wiggling in his lap. 

Joel’s hand comes down on you again, the loud sound echoing in the otherwise silent house. “And we’re gonna start over if you don’t count them for me.” 

Another spank has your eyes squeezing shut. “That’s three then” you pant.  

“Nope, we’re starting from the beginning” Joel says before connecting his palm to your ass again. “That’s one.” 

You try twisting out of his grip once again and his next smack is even harder. 

“Stop trying to escape or I’m gonna add more. Now count for me” 

You stop wiggling, slowly starting to accept defeat. 

“Two.” 

Joel hums in approval and lands another harsh smack to your cheek. 

“Three” you say obediently, still trying to cover the tremor in your voice. You’re still fuming and the fact that he has you pinned down like this, completely unable to move is fueling your fire. 

Another smack.

“Four.” 

By the nineth, you’re clinging to the last shred of your control. Your cheeks are burning hot, your skin raised in the shape of Joel’s handprint. By now, you can feel him fully hard pressing against your abdomen. 

“Nine.” 

Joel can hear the tremble in your voice now, clear as day. He silently rubs his palm over your cheek, soothing the warm, swollen skin. 

His soft touch is gone as soon as it came, his fingers quickly finding your slit instead. With no warning, he plunges two fingers inside of you, easily curling his fingertips against your g-spot. 

“Yeah, I knew you’d be fuckin’ soaked” Joel says with a breathless chuckle as he keeps prodding against your spot, the lewd sounds of his fingers moving inside you echoing around the room. You cry out in surprise as Joel relentlessly punches his fingers against the spot that sends massive waves of hot liquid pleasure up your spine. You try to swallow your moans, still refusing to give in to him all the way and bite your lip until you taste the metallic tang of blood.  

“Just give it up, baby. I know you want to” Joel coos. And he’s right, you want nothing more than to just give it up and let him put you in your place. But you can’t give up just yet. This wasn’t the first time Joel has punished you and every time he does, there’s something inside you, an urge to find out how far Joel will take your punishments. 

So, you shake your head as much as you can with his hand still holding your neck against the couch cushion.

 Joel clicks his tongue disapprovingly letting you know that you made another bad choice. You suppress a groan when he pulls his fingers out of you. He takes his hand off your neck and grips both of your cheeks and spreads you open. You quietly hiss at the bite of the cold air against your burning wet heat. 

“Such a pretty pussy” Joel whispers as he leans over to get a good look. It takes everything in you not to moan and wiggle your hips in his face as he keeps you spread open and inspects you. 

Then there’s the sound of Joel spitting behind you. You swallow thickly, pushing down another moan once you feel the warm liquid dribble onto your skin and slide down between your cheeks. Your chest tightens at the sensation, and you bite your cheek as a hot wave of arousal crashes down over you. 

He sits up straight again, his hand quickly coming back to wrap around the back of your neck and hold you in place again. With his other hand, he finds your puckered hole and rubs over it with the pad of his thumb, using his spit as lube. You let out one small whine when the tip of it catches on your rim. 

“C’mon, angel. Lemme hear those pretty sounds and I’ll let you cum” Joel presses.

You can’t possibly hold out any longer. Not with your skin hot and burning from your spanking, his fingers pushing hard against your g-spot, his thumb teasing your asshole and the big, strong hand holding you down by your fucking neck. 

There’s nothing you can do to stop the loud moan that tumbles past your lips as he moves his fingers reach deeper inside of you until he presses a spot even deeper inside you. 

“There it is” Joel sighs, his chest swelling with pride as you tremble and start to fall apart underneath him. “That’s a good girl.” 

He stays in position for a little longer, your pretty sounds filling the room as he gives you exactly what you need. You’re already close because of course Joel knows how to get you there in just a couple of minutes. He knows your body almost better than his, knows what makes you tick and recognizes all of your signs. 

So, it’s not surprising that he hears the specific moans and can feel the way that you clench around his fingers, wordlessly letting him know that you’re about to reach the edge. 

And it shouldn’t be surprising when he suddenly slips his fingers out of you and lands a final smack to your ass, heavier and louder than all the others, but it still makes you cry out. You whimper at the loss of his touch and the way the burning pain radiating from his hits mixes so deliciously with the pleasure coursing through your veins. 

“Count, angel” Joel says calmly, giving you a friendly reminder that you’re still in trouble.  Five minutes ago, you would’ve ripped his head off for saying that. But obeying is a lot easier when you’re teetering on the edge of an orgasm. 

“Ten. Ten, sir. Thank you” you mewl. You know that he’s probably not going to let you cum soon. You’ve been here enough times to know that much. Still, you wiggle your hips, hoping that he’d go easy on you and slide his fingers back inside you. But Joel is not known for going easy on anyone.

“Good girl using your manners” Joel praises. “But you were a very bad girl earlier. Do you think bad girls deserve to cum?” he asks, quickly washing away any of your hopes of an orgasm in the near future. 

Joel doesn’t say anything else as he maneuvers you again, pushing your legs to the ground and holding down on your shoulders until you’re kneeling in front of him while he remains seated on the couch. 

You look up at him with wide eyes, your chest heaving as your knees dig into the hardwood floors underneath you as you stay still and quietly wait for his instructions. You have no fight left in you, completely surrendering to him just in hopes of being able to cum at least once tonight. 

Joel smiles down at you and cups your jaw. You immediately nuzzle against his palm and bat your eyelashes innocently at him. 

“Now suck my cock like a good girl I know you are.” 

You follow Joel’s command easily and reach for the waistband of his sweatpants. You pull down his pants and boxers to his mid-thigh, his hard cock slapping up against his lower abdomen. 

With no other preface, you take him in your mouth, your lips wrapped around his tip as you roll your tongue all around his sensitive head. And apparently that’s more than enough teasing for Joel because his hand comes up to the back of your head and forces you down his length. 

You gag at the sudden intrusion and try to quickly recover, not wanting to give Joel another reason to punish you more. His hand remains heavy on your head, holding you in place with his cock down your throat as you drool around him for a few more seconds, your cunt throbbing between your legs as he uses you. 

“Gonna fuck that attitude right out your smart little mouth” Joel huffs. 

You give a small nod, and he lets go of your head, letting you pull off for a breath. He watches you intently as gasp for air, smirking when you start to cough. 

“My cock too big for you, angel?” Joel teases as he brings a thumb to the corner of your mouth to wipe up your drool before pushing it back in your mouth. You shake your head no and Joel smiles at you and removes his thumb so you can talk. 

“No, sir. I can take it” you reply breathlessly. 

“Yeah, I know you can, angel. Now show me how good you can be for me.” 

With another small nod you take him back in your mouth. His hand returns to the back your head and he rolls his hips up, pushing himself down your throat.

You stay as still as possible, keeping your mouth and throat open and letting Joel fuck your throat. You’ve had him in your mouth almost every day since the first month you met him, but your jaw already starts to ache like it’s impossible to get used to the sheer size of his cock. Drool starts to spill out of the corner of your mouth again and you shamelessly let it run down your chin.

Joel shows no mercy, bucking up into you like he’s completely disregarding the fact that you need to breathe. But you know he’s not. You know he has a careful eye on you, watching for signs that he’s pushing you too far. 

“Takin’ me so well, angel. Knew you could be good for me” Joel grunts, encouraging you to keep going as the hand on your head briefly pets your hair. 

All the anger that had been building for the past couple of days has dissipated. All the stress about your job and your ridiculous boss were miles away and now the only thing you're thinking about is Joel's thick cock down your throat.

You stay there for what feels like forever and allow him to use you as he pleases. Your neglected pussy clenches desperately around nothing, slick leaking down your thighs because how could you not be turned on with Joel using you like his personal fucktoy. 

You’re now drooling everywhere, absolutely soaking his cock as you breathe heavily through your nose, your eyelids heavy. And as much as Joel wants to continue to fuck your mouth until your jaw breaks, he can’t hold back his own pleasure for much longer. 

After a couple more thrusts down your throat, he abruptly pulls out and His hand is a blur as you watch him fist himself for a couple of seconds until he starts to cum. His moans and little whimpers send fire straight to your core as he paints your face with hot ropes of cum. He’s messy with it, letting it get everywhere, your chin, your mouth, your cheeks, and your hair. You mewl quietly and press your thighs together searching for any sort of friction on your dripping pussy as Joel marks you, claiming you as his.  

You patiently wait for him come back down, listening his quiet groans as he pumps out every drop. 

Finally, with a heavy sigh, he leans back against the couch and drops his hand from your head again. 

“You look so pretty all covered in my cum, angel” Joel says with a lopsided smile. You smile sweetly back at him, your eyelashes fluttering against your flushed cheek. He swipes a thumb through the mess on your cheek and slides it past your lips. You suck his thumb clean, swallowing down everything he gives you. 

He revels in the sensation of you suckling on his thumb for a little bit before slipping it out with a soft pop. You look up at him, waiting for his next instruction with the hopes of having your own release soon. 

“Knew you could be good, angel. Now go finish cleaning the kitchen and then I’ll think about letting you cum.” 

Your jaw drops as you stare up at him with wide eyes. Joel just laughs cruelly at your expression. 

“But...but Joel, please I want-”

“Should’ve thought about that earlier, angel. You know bad girls don’t get to cum. Now get up and finish cleaning” Joel says with a sickeningly sweet tone. You blink at him a few more times hoping he’d miraculously change his mind. 

But he doesn’t. So, with your attitude completely gone now, you follow his directions and shakily stand up. You give him one more pathetic, pleading look but he just smirks back at you. Accepting defeat, you turn and walk back to the kitchen.  

“And don’t even think about cleanin’ your face yet” Joel calls out from behind you. 

Ty for reading hugs and smoochies for all of you!!!

[discoscoob]

⋆⭒˚.⋆ ALL I WANT FOR CHRISTMAS IS YOU

˙ ✩°˖🎄⋆｡˚ Ted Logan x Reader

KEANUVERSE SECRET SANTA: My contribution to @faerl’s Keanuverse secret santa project for my giftee @scarlettspectra! 🎁

SAN DIMAS, CHRISTMAS EVE 1992

Below a slanting ‘Merry Christmas’ banner, Ted is sprawled across the well worn, pre-loved couch, his long, gangly frame fitting awkwardly. Mismatched socked feet dangle over the edge of the armrest, while his arms drape snuggly around your waist as you nestle peacefully across his body with your head tucked under his chin. A santa hat sits askew atop his unruly dark locks that have fallen over his sleeping face.

You sniffle as the framed photo begins to gently blur from the gathering tears clouding your vision. Bill had captured the candid moment of you and Ted having a post Christmas dinner nap. How you wish you could travel back to that precious moment, nuzzled comfortably in Ted’s warm embrace. Of course, afterward, Bill had taken a permanent marker to both your faces, leaving the two of you with drawn-on moustaches until the new year — it earned Ted some strange glances when he served customers at Pretzels ‘n’ Cheese.

Carefully returning the photo to its pride of place on your nightstand, you pick up the mixtape Ted sent you. The hand drawn candy canes, forming the shape of a love-heart on the cover, brings a watery smile to your lips — reminding you how much thought he puts into even the simplest of gestures. The smooth melody of Please Come Home for Christmas by Charles Brown drifts from the cassette player and seeps straight into your aching heart, stoking the heavy swell of longing that presses against your chest.

Yesterday, Ted called you from a payphone at Fairbanks Airport with the devastating news that a blizzard was grounding all the flights, forcing him to holdover at the military base in Alaska for the holidays.

The moment you pressed the phone to your ear and he uttered your name in a quiet quiver, you knew something was wrong. Your heart sank like a boulder. He sounded so defeated. The two of you had exchanged stacks of letters filled with plans and promises of making the most of your time together over the holiday season, hoping to compensate for the months spent apart. Now, you can’t even talk to him over the phone because the lines are down.

You haven’t physically seen him since he left for military school in the spring — the longest the two of you have ever been apart since you met in high school. Both you and Bill had begged him not to go, insisting that you were happy to support him as he couch-surfed between your place and Bill’s dad’s after his own father flat-out refused to take him back in. That refusal came after he and Bill got evicted from their apartment for falling behind on the rent.

At that time, it felt like one knock back after another. With the band going nowhere, no matter how hard they tried, Ted couldn’t shake the feeling that he was a burden and a failure. His father’s relentless words would echo in the back of his mind, always there to remind him he would never amount to anything.

It had all come to a head one night after yet another failed audition to get on the bill at some music club. That’s when Ted ran into Colonel Oats. The man barely had to say a word — just a gruff “it’s not too late” — and something inside Ted broke. He was so beaten down, so full of self-doubt, that he thought it might be his only option left. A week later, he was packing for Alaska.

You had wept your heart out — not only for the fact that Ted would be miles away, but for how beat down he must’ve felt to even consider leaving in the first place. You had let him down. You hadn’t reminded him enough of how incredible he was. You hadn’t defeated his father’s voice in his head. You felt like a terrible girlfriend.

You cross the room, switch off the cassette player, and eject the mixtape just as the opening notes of Darlene Love’s Christmas (Baby Please Come Home) start playing. Ironically, most of the songs Ted had chosen were about longing for loved ones to be home for the holidays, and with him stormbound in Alaska, they’ve become unbearable to listen to.

Your doorbell chimes and you quickly check your reflection in the mirror above your dresser. Puffy red eyes stare back at you with glistening tears reflecting the glow of twinkling Christmas lights, you soak them up on the sleeve of your sweater in vain as more soon gather.

As soon as you open the door, a hard chest ploughs into you, almost knocking you off balance until a pair of strong arms swoop you off your feet — all before you even get a good look at your visitor. You would have kicked and screamed if it weren’t for the sweet scent of blue raspberry swaddling your senses, Ted’s favourite candy, inviting you to sink into his sturdy embrace.

With all the enthusiasm of a boisterous Great Dane, blissfully ignorant of its own colossal size and strength,

Ted clutches you tightly against him, his arms noticeably bulkier than the gangly limbs you recall.

He burrows his face into the curve of your neck as you cradle the back of his head, eager to delve your fingers into his thick tousled mane. Instead, they stroke over smooth, freshly chopped strands. You falter briefly, before pulling back to get your first proper look at him since he arrived on your doorstep.

“Your hair…” you blink, momentarily stunned as you drink in the sight of him. Where an unruly mop of tousled locks once sprouted and tumbled over his eyes, there’s now a military buzz cut, clipped uniformly to reveal the sharp angles of his face and stubble-dusted jaw.

You didn’t intend for that to be the first thing you said to him after all this time apart, it tumbled out before you could stop it. You wince, realising how many other things you could have — no, should have — said instead.

“You hate it.” Ted’s broad grin falters as he sheepishly rubs the nape of his neck, dipping his gaze to the floor, clearly self-conscious.

Your lips part, and you quickly shake your head, your heart hammering at the thought he might believe you could hate anything about him.

“You… your ears will get cold.” you caress his jaw, noticing the reddened tips of his ears.

Your concern eases his pink lips into a coy smile as he leans his rose-tinted cheek into your warm palm.

“Mhm… then you’d best let me in before I turn into a popsicle or something.”

Wrapping your fingers around the edge of his jacket, you tug him inside as he kicks the door shut against the cold with the heel of his combat boot. He eases his bass guitar case carefully against the wall and shrugs his heavy duffle bag off his shoulder, letting it thud softly to the floor.

“I don’t understand…” you step back deeper into the living room, still tugging Ted along with you. “How did you get here? I thought the flights were grounded.”

“Santa’s sleigh!” he jokes with a giggle, ducking his head to pepper kisses across your cheeks and forehead. His enormous hands hold you steady while his eyes sparkle with delight.

You’ve always known Ted to be affectionate — it’s undeniable that physical touch is his love language. But even by his standards, there’s a noticeable shift. As they say, absence makes the heart grow fonder — and in Ted’s case, bolder. His once restrained and hesitant displays of affection, shaped by his benign nature and lack of experience, have given way to a liberated eagerness to show you just how much he’s missed you.

“There’s this, like, total rich dude at school,” he pauses just long enough to rest his forehead against yours. “His dad’s some mayor or something, like, really important. He managed to pull a few strings and got a private jet to fly him out.”

He tucks a loose strand of hair behind your ear, his dilated pupils flicker to your neck. “And… he offered me a ride.”

“Wait…” there’s a noticeable flutter in your voice when he starts kissing the side of your neck, sending pleasant shivers down your spine. “A private jet?”

“Hm-hm…” his warm breath fans across your skin and you feel his lips twitch into a smile. “Felt like a total rockstar.”

Ted raises his head with a softening expression. “I missed you.” he murmurs, his doe eyes briefly meeting yours with timid sincerity, before dropping back to the carpeted floor.

“I missed you too, Ted. So much.” gently, you curl your forefinger under his chin, giving him a soft nudge to lift his head. As he looks up, you lean in and press a tender welcome home kiss to his lips.

˙ ✩°˖🎄⋆｡˚

Cocooned by Ted’s impressive wingspan, his chin hooks over your shoulder as his nimble fingers flit across the fretboard with a newfound ease. No longer is he serenading you with out-of-tune melodies or clumsy, off-beat riffs. Now, you’re motivated to softly sing along to the unmistakable, toe-tapping groove of one of your favourite songs.

The fluidity of his precise and controlled movements are so captivating, you’re locked in an almost hypnotic trance as your gaze lingers on his long and skilful fingers. The dedication he must’ve poured into practicing during his downtime at military school is remarkable, however, your unrestrained mind is soon bombarded with vivid images of all the possible ways you could reap the benefits of his enhanced dexterity.

Regrettably, the visions only intensify when he gently guides your far less experienced fingers along the neck of his bass while his breath tickles along the shell of your ear with soft-spoken instructions. You gulp, noticing that it’s not just the calloused tips of his fingers that are new. A fresh scar cuts across the back of his hand, presumably left behind by the whip of a snapped string — a subtle badge of honour to his devotion and passion for music.

Unfortunately, a dark cloud lingers at the back of your mind, casting a shadow over the moment, reminding you of how fleeting it is. When the new year arrives, Ted will return to Alaska and you won’t see him again until blossoms bloom on the trees and rainbows are painted across the sky after sunshowers. While you want to be content and savour the moment, there’s a throbbing ache in your chest that is impossible to ignore, it snatches your focus and prevents you from fully appreciating the time you have together.

“Babe, you totally keep zoning out.” Ted teases, cutting through your spiralling thoughts to pull your focus back to the present.

“Huh?” you freeze, trying to buy yourself some time to come up with an excuse by feigning confusion. You’re already working on eradicating whatever outward expression you were wearing as you nose-dived through the whirlwind of trepidation.

Your Ted, ever patient and sweet, sets his bass aside with care to give you his undivided attention, attentively settling his now-empty hands lightly on your knees.

“Something’s wrong. What is it?” he coaxes, his brows scrunching with concern.

You rearrange your face into a smile, trying to alleviate that heavy pressure in your chest.

“I’m just distracted by how skillful you’ve become with your fingers now.” you tease, your smile turning cheeky as you take his larger hand in your own, pressing your lips to his calloused tips.

“Oh…” Ted gulps, his cheeks tingeing pink as he shyly averts his gaze. Even after all these years together, Ted still becomes a flustered puppy at the slightest hint of suggestiveness.

In the background, Die Hard plays on the staticky TV. Neither of you have been paying much attention, but just as Hans Gruber plummets from the window of Nakatomi Plaza, Ted blurts out, "I'm not going back to Alaska in the new year."

Your head snaps toward him, your wide eyes meeting his as your mouth falls agape.

"What?"

"I'm not going back," he repeats, and the weight of his words settles over you like the warmest blanket, replacing the suffocating mass of anxiety that had been choking you moments before.

Your face eases into a genuine, uncontainable smile as your heart leaps weightlessly in your chest. You throw your arms around him, nearly knocking him across the couch in your excitement. “I’m so relieved you’re not leaving. I couldn’t bear saying goodbye again.”

“Me neither.” Ted mirrors your smile as he secures his arms around you properly, but there’s a slight shadow in his expression — something else lingering unsaid.

“There’s, uh… there’s more,” he says, tugging himself back but keeping his hands on your shoulders.

“More?”

“I’ve um… like put in an application to the LAPD.” the excitement bubbling in your chest is replaced by confusion.

"Wait. You want to be a cop?"

Ted nods slowly.

"Like... your dad?"

Ted looks startled, his brows shoot up and he waves his hands as if trying to manually wash away the thought from your mind.

“Woah, no way! That, like- he has nothing to do with it. I mean, I don’t care about what he thinks anymore. It’s… I dunno-” he looks down at his lap, his shoulders lifting slightly in a small shrug. “I had a lot of time to think in Alaska and… I guess I was actually pretty good at some of the stuff they taught us… for the first time in forever, I felt like I wasn’t flailing around trying to figure out what I’m supposed to do with my life. And maybe… maybe I could use that to help people… like be a hero or something.”

You tilt your head as his words settle over you, still processing them. Despite his sincerity, apprehension lingers. You can’t shake the worry that he might be rushing into something else he feels he has to do — just like he did with military school. "But... the LAPD?"

"Yeah." His gaze softens, and his lips curve into that sweet, earnest smile that always makes your heart flutter. "I don't want to go all the way back to Alaska. I can't stand the thought of being away from you again until the spring. If I stay in LA, I'll be much closer… and maybe…” he pauses, his smile turning hopeful. “Maybe you could even come with me…”

Your breath hitches at his words and the endearing sight of his hopeful smile. You don’t even question the thought of uprooting your life to follow Ted, there’s no doubt in your mind, your heart belongs with his. Before you can respond, his hand drifts up to play with a strand of your hair, idly twirling it around his finger as he gazes at you, his voice softening.

“I know it’s a lot to think about, you don’t have to decide anything right now.”

“I’d follow you anywhere, Ted.” you assure him, needing no time to make up your mind.

Ted’s face lights up brighter than the Christmas lights.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

He pulls you into his arms again, his fingers threading through your hair with care. You close your eyes, nestling into the crook of his neck as Ted tucks his head against your shoulder.

Credit to @scarlettspectra for the headcanon that Jack Traven is older Ted if he was sent to military school. I love that headcanon so much and I had to steal it writing this so technically this is a little bit of a pre-speed Jack fic too. Chopping off Ted’s floppy hair did hurt me though 😔

My little easter egg is that the rich kid who’s father is the mayor is Scott Favor who was forced to go to military school if he wanted to receive his inheritance

[everettswritings]

Hello my dude, how about a Lee! Mystic Flour story? She's very stoic and apathetic, so a few laughs wouldn't hurt her lol

Real, real. I would like to hear her laugh. I’d like to wreck her, but I think I’d be turned into flour. Anywho, hope you enjoy! (Kink/NSFW accounts DNI!)

Atop the summit of the mountain where a single peach tree lay, Mystic Flour Cookie almost couldn’t believe her eyes. The young cookie who she nearly dragged down into enlightenment, the cold embrace of apathy, with her had turned back against her in the last few moments. Now the Twin Dragons were perched on his shoulders and his… her Soul Jam glowed brightly with the flame of resolution. A part of her felt almost disappointed. He was so close to seeing the world through eyes just like hers. He almost understood her.

“After every trial I’ve faced, the hardships I’ve endured to reach this very summit, I can see clearer than ever now.” He proclaimed, standing with his chin held high as if his burdens were all lifted, “I can see your insecurities. You’re still upset with your failures, so you lash out and try to punish others for your own shortcomings.” He continued. Mystic Flour Cookie could almost shrink back at his words, as if she knew they were true deep down.

She scoffed, “It’s saddening how you project your own problems onto me, cookie. Especially with how close to the truth you really were” she said plainly. Dark Cacao Cookie let an amused exhale through his nose, setting his sword aside and approaching her, “Your words would have been true mere moments ago. However, you don’t have a singular right to tell me about the ‘truth’ when you hid yourself in a cocoon for years rather than facing the world outside!” He crossed his arms. Mystic Flour Cookie subconsciously stepped back, still maintaining her air of emptiness, “And you locked yourself in your precious Citadel… we are not too different in that department. However, no matter what, you cannot undo what is done. I will not bring your cookies back because you tried to intimidate me.” She pointed out, opening her eyes with a hint of smugness.

“I know. That’s why I haven’t struck you down just yet… I believe I have a better solution than a fight, at least to get you to give my denizens back to me.” He stepped closer once again.

Now the Beast was confused. What could he possibly do to harm her or convince her to take it all back? She still firmly believed that what she did was in the right. Everything would turn to flour one day, so what was wrong about bringing the world a little closer to it’s end?

Suddenly, she felt him poking at her sides. She stifled a chuckle, already having to fight herself not to laugh.

”W-What’re you doing?” She asked with a stutter, almost breaking when she opened her mouth. “I figured that since you wish to act so childishly, I might as well treat you as such.” He grinned, moving his hands to lightly scratch at her ribs, finally getting a few giggles out of her. They were gentle and airy, about as light as the clouds that covered the base of the mountains. “Hehe… hehehee! Enough! So insohoholent!” As soon as those giggles squeaked through, they slowly began to pour out more and more like water through a bursting damn, “A-Arrogant, greedy little-! Hahahaha! Hahaha… hehehehe!” She sank to the cool floor below.

Dark Cacao Cookie smirked triumphantly, moving down alongside her and holding up her arm to continue his attack on her side. His fingers started pressing and dancing along her dough as if he were playing the piano. “Give my cookies back.” He egged on, “Noho! Hahaha! Hahahaha!” She started laughing harder, “Have it your way.”. Dark Cacao Cookie sat down, pulling Mystic Flour Cookie into his lap and summoning the dragons to help hold her down. Then, of course, he resumed his efforts and started pinching around her tummy and on each rib.

Mystic Flour Cookie shook her head, stubbornly trying to resist giving in, “Such arrogance! Hahahaha! Hahaha! Hahahahahaha! No!”. Dark Cacao Cookie rolled his eyes, but didn’t say anything and continued tickling her. Unfortunately for the leavened one, the dragons wanted to have their fun as well and the tips of their tails started flicking up and down her armpits. She struggled to suppress the squeal that bubbled up in her chest, and her white face was starting to flush pink.

She was laughing so much now, more than she had ever laughed in years! She had almost forgotten how to, it felt like. She started struggling and squirming, not even bothering to hold back anymore, “Nohohoho! Stahahahap! I’m not- hahahaha!” She tried to insist on her stance. She saw Dark Cacao Cookie nod to the dragons, suddenly the White Dragon moved it’s head to nip at her knees and the Black Dragon found it’s mouth firmly planted on her tummy to nibble as well. Oh no, that done her in!

“EEEEHHHHH! HAHAHAHAHA! HAHAHAHA! HAHAHA! NO! I WON’T!” Mystic Flour Cookie couldn’t even speak beyond that, every word she could’ve said was drowned out by howls of her own laughter. Dark Cacao Cookie dug his hands harder into her ribs, drawing out more squeaky laughs and squeals from the Beast’s mouth.

She had to give up now. Otherwise she’d never be released! It was humiliating, but at least the others weren’t around to watch this child completely destroying her.

“OKAY!” She wheezed, squeezing her eyes back shut as to not see his victorious face, “HEHEHEHE! HAHAHAHA! I-I’LL GIVE THEM BACK! IT’S UNDONE! HAHAHAHA! HAHAHA! HAHAHAHAHA! STAHP!”. Mystic Flour Cookie immediately began gasping for air as soon as she was released, having to forcefully pull all that air back into her lungs. “Good. That’s all you had to say!” Dark Cacao Cookie chuckled, putting his hands on the floor and hoisting himself back up to standing. She couldn’t stand to look at him right now, but she knew exactly the expression he wore on his face.

Such arrogance! Oh, how he’d pay. But for now, she’ll just retreat and gather her strength once more. She’ll lurk in the shadows until her time to strike comes.

the end

I seriously hope I did Mystic Flour Cookie right because I suck at writing apathetic characters! Either I don’t make them apathetic enough, or I make them too apathetic and it makes them bland. Anywho, have a good one 🫶

[brittle-doughie]

4th time I've sent this ask, sorry if I seem inpatient. Hello I came up with Y/n cookie idea which includes Royal icing and crowned cupcake cookie based on these lyrics!

summary: They kidnap Y/n which causes them to develop different personalities overtime due to trauma. The personalities, whilst dislike eachother, take control most of the time with and without the presence of the siblings in fear of them traumatizing y/n even more. They try to get rid of the personalities but instead unknowingly got rid of Y/n forever leading to the personalities to grieve for the loss of Y/n and are resentful of the 2. When Royal icing and crowned cupcake cookie left the personalities gathered enough inner strength to break out of the basement where they were kept in. They trashed and destroyed the place and as an F you to the siblings, they burnt down their place of living right infront of them. The personalities in Y/n's body now live in peace in the woods far away from civilization to hide from the 2 siblings; still grieving for Y/n.

"So I guess I've made my bed. I can't lie to myself, anymore. And I put myself through hell, I hear the bells. My hair is growing thin, my eyes are sunken in. And every morning shows how bad a keeper I have BEEN.

BUZZ BUZZ BUZZ BUZZ! HYPERACTIVE HORNETS IN MY- LUNGS LUNGS LUNGS LUNGS! SICK OF FEELING NOTHING LIKE- ENOUGH NOUGH NOUGH. I'm so- STUCK STUCK STUCK! AND MY BODY IS INHABITED BY BUGS BUGS BUGS!

SHUT UP UP UP UP! NOTHING EVER MATTERS TILL IT- DOES DOES DOES DOES! THINK I'LL START A FIRE JUST FOR FUN! THE SUN! IS LOADED LIKE A GUN, AND SHOOTING VENOM RIGHT INTO MY BLOOD BLOOD BLOOD BLOOD BLOOD!

I can barely SEE you standing right in view of VIVID apparations who PROJECT THEMSELVES onto PICTURE PERFECT CELLS. I can barely SEE you standing right in view of VIVID apparations who PROJECT THEMSELVES onto PICTURE PERFECT CELLS. I can barely SEE you standing right in view of VIVID apparations who PROJECT THEMSELVES onto PICTURE PERFECT CELLS.

SWEET RELIEF LIKE CONCRETE LIVES UNDER MY DREAMS, HAS MORE TO LOSE THAN MEEEEE!

Become the catalyst, till the chaos consume me till I consume it and take command. command CHANCE, command TRUTH, command FEAR, command...RISK."

Song is called "Fire4fun" by Jhariah btw ok bye.

Getting kinda burnt out on lyric asks, might hold off on them for a bit after this one

"So I guess I've made my bed. I can't lie to myself, anymore. And I put myself through hell, I hear the bells. My hair is growing thin, my eyes are sunken in. And every morning shows how bad a keeper I have BEEN.”

Y/N had made their choice back there and they can’t deny what they did. They had been put through a lot whether by the siblings or to themselves while they survived in the woods, as shown with how their state deteriorated with their hair and their eyes.

“I can barely SEE you standing right in view of VIVID apparations who PROJECT THEMSELVES onto PICTURE PERFECT CELLS.“

Y/N had once let their judgement be clouded by the picture perfect images of the siblings, making them unable to see what type of people they really were.

“Become the catalyst, till the chaos consume me till I consume it and take command. command CHANCE, command TRUTH, command FEAR, command...RISK."

The burning down of their living space was just the fire starter of what could likely lead to a dark path for Y/N Cookie, letting darkness and chaos take control of their mind. It’s better to be feared then loved if one cannot have both, and being feared was looking to be pretty tempting right now…